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Looking Forward 



A Treatise on the Status of Woman 

and 

The Origin and Growth of the Family and 
the State 



BY 

PHILIP RAPPAPORT 



History without political science has no fruit : 
Political science without history has no root. 

— Sir John Richard Seetey 



CHICAGO 

CHARLES H. KERR & COMPANY 

1906 






LIBRARY of CONGRESS 
Two Coofes Received 

JUL 9 1906 

*7 Copyrlifht Entry 

/TUuf/eLifH 

CLASS /CJt'xXt. No? 




Copyright, 1906 
By Philip Rappaport 



o 



FOREWORD. 

This book is written from the standpoint of historic 
materialism. The theory of historic materialism is young 
and, so far as I am aware, no economist, sociologist or 
historian, using the English language, has made any ser- 
ious attempt toward its application in his investigations. 
What has been written upon the subjects treated in this 
book with reference to that theory is scattered in scien- 
tific and philosophical books and periodicals, mostly 
known only to men of learning, and I know of no book 
in the English language investigating those subjects on 
the basis of historic materialism popularly enough, so as 
to be adapted to the needs of the general public. 

Carlyle would never have called political economy the 
dismal science, if it had had^ advanced already to the 
study of the evolution of economics, of the lines on which 
it proceeded and does proceed from the beginning of 
human society up to our own time, and the connection 
between the economic structure of society and social and 
political institutions. Instead of that, political econo- 
mists considered the continued existence of the present 
economic system with, perhaps, some slight modifica- 
tions, a matter per se and studied only the inter-relations 
of causes and effects within the system. Thus, political 
economy degenerated into a mere science of trade, able 
to serve only the working out of rules and systems of 
private economy for individual use. 

That was a dismal science, indeed. It was unable to 
kindle a ray of hope, to warm a single soul. A political 
economy which was unable to develop a higher ideal than 
buying cheap and selling dear could not possibly awaken 
response or enthusiasm in any human heart, and could 
produce nothing but mute resignation among the suffer- 
ing masses and utter disregard of their woes among 



4 FOREWORD 

those whom the chances of fate had placed on the sunny 
side of Hfe. 

To-day we know better. Although political economy 
as officially taught at colleges and universities is still im- 
pregnated with the same spirit of hopelessness, yet those 
who are free to speak teach us that economic systems 
share the fate of everything on earth. They come and 
go ; they live and die. Some day in the future there will 
hardly be a remnant left of our economic institutions. 
Wiith the knowledge of the past the human mind busies 
itself with the creation of goals to strife for, of ideals 
to fight for. What matters it whether the goal will be 
realized exactly as it had been contrived by thought and 
longing? What matters it whether the social edifice of 
the future will correspond exactly to the ideal created 
by reasoning intellect and lofty imagination? There is 
hope, there is expectation, there is life, there is enthusi- 
asm, there is struggle and there is the certainty of a 
better future. 

It is the object of this book to enable the reader to 
form his own judgment of future possibilities and proba- 
bilities from historical knowledge. I will attempt to 
show that what is has come to be, not because it was 
willed by man, but as the necessary and logical sequence 
of what was, and that the future will be the result of the 
same process of evolution. The parts which man plays 
in this process and his activities are not capricious and 
self-willed, but spring with necessity from motives which 
result from conditions. 

I have some hope that a better knowledge of this 
truth will serve to remove many prejudices and be pro- 
ductive of more patience with and tolerance of the opin- 
ions of others. 

The Author. 



Tis a foe invisible 
The which I fear — a fearful enemy, 

Which in the human heart opposes me, 
By its coward fear alone made fearful to me. 

Not that, which full of life, instinct with power, 
Makes known its present being; that is not 

The true, the perilously formidable. 
Oh no ! it is the common, the quite common. 

The thing of an eternal yesterday. 
What ever was, and evermore returns. 
Sterling to-morrow, for to-day 't was sterling! 
For of the wholly common is man made, 

And custom is his nurse. Woe then to them 
Who lay irreverent hands upon his old 

House furniture, the dear inheritance 
From his forefathers! For time consecrates; 

And what is gray with age becomes religious. 
Be in possession, and thou hast the right. 

And sacred will the many guard it for thee. 

J.SCHILLER, 'The Death of Wallenstein.'O 



CONTENTS 

CHAPTER. PAGE. 

I Introduction 7 

II The Status of Woman 48 

III The Family 91 

IV Divorce 114 

V Prostitution 136 

VI The State 146 

VII The Modern Economic System 186 

VIII Conclusion 209 



LOOKING FORWARD 



INTRODUCTION. 

The State and the family are social institutions, and 
as such, of course, have their history. Likewise, the 
status of woman in society has its history. Having a 
history, in this instance means to have been different at 
different times, to have undergone changes. Neither 
the social status of woman, nor the family, nor the form 
of social organization have always been what they are 
now. We have what we call the woman movement for 
the betterment of the condition of women, socially, 
economically and poHtically. The numerous divorces, 
of which we hear so frequent complaints, prove at least 
one thing, namely, that the family itself offers no guar- 
anty of happiness; and the many cases of abandonment, 
infidelity and cruel treatment show that the family, as 
an institution, leaves room for improvement. The ex- 
istence of what is generally called the social evil is also 
partly evidence of the imperfection of the family. The 
imperfections of our government are so frequently men- 
tioned in speeches and newspapers that their existence 
needs no proof. 

The status of woman and the imperfections of our 
family life, as well as our political life, offer problems 
for solution. For the purpose of understanding prob- 
lems and finding means to solve them, it is necessary to 

? 



8 LOOKING FORWARD 

know the history and the course of development of the 
status or the institutions which present the problem, un- 
less we are sure that in the history and in the evolution 
of society no other forces prevail but mere chance or 
the casual caprice of man. If, on the contrary, we are 
of the opinion that evolution is governed by certain prin- 
ciples, or certain influences, be they of a natural or so- 
cial character, it is clear that no presumptions as to the 
future can be correct, which are not based upon the 
knowledge of those principles or influences. If we do 
not know them, we must try to find them. Whatever men 
do, we cannot but believe that in their actions they are 
guided by some reasons and that these reasons are in 
some way related to the conditions surrounding them. 
We must know how the State and the family came to 
be what they are, and how the status of woman came 
to be what it is, if we want to avoid error in our con- 
clusions as to the possibility and the direction of changes 
in the future. Religious orthodoxy may believe that 
everything is the effect of God's will, but science and 
philosophy cannot rest at that, or they must go out of 
business. For, there is surely no reason whatsoever, 
why, if everything in the past went according to God's 
will, it should not do so in the future. And if so, of 
what use can it be to trouble ourselves with social prob- 
lems? 

We have societies for this reform and that reform, 
societies composed of men, and such composed of 
v/omen, they publish programs and pass resolutions, but 
they all seem to act under the belief that social institu- 
tions can be reformed or altered at the will of well- 
meaning reformers without regard to their history and 
th» course of their development. The historical sense 



INTRODUCTION 9 

IS not well developed in Americans; probably because 
the country is young and has not much of a history, 
compared with the older countries of the world. Al- 
though there is hardly a subject more adapted to broaden 
the mind, than history, yet our public schools confine 
themselves mostly to national history and impart only 
very meagre instruction, if any at all, in the history of 
the world. 

Yet, it should not be forgotten that the history of 
the old world is, to some extent, also the history of 
our own country, that the first white settlers on this 
continent were not a newly created race, but 
brought the views, the customs and the usages of the 
old world with them, that civilized life on this continent 
was only a continuation of the life upon the other hemi- 
sphere, and that civilization did not commence from a 
new starting-point. 

But even the history of our own country is taught 
without spirit and philosophy, the spirit of patriotism, 
perhaps, excepted. But this spirit alone, unaccompanied 
by other thoughts and sentiments, is more apt to drown 
intellectual understanding than to impart it. History 
is taught as if it were nothing but a chronology of 
events, springing from the heroism or the wisdom of 
certain individuals. Sociologists and modern historians, 
however, take a different view, and search for the forces 
behind the human will. "We shall thus be led,'' says 
Buckle in his history of the civilization of England, '^to 
one vast question, which indeed lies at the root of the 
whole subject, and is simply this : Are the actions of 
men, and therefore of societies, governed by fixed laws, 
or are they the result either of chance or of supernatural 
interference?" "Fortunately,'' he also says, " the 



10 IvOOKING FORWARD 

believer in the posibility of a science of history is not 
called upon to hold either the doctrine of predestined 
events, or that of freedom of the will ; and the only posi- 
tions which I shall expect him to concede are the 

following: That when we perform an action, we per- 
form it in consequence of some motive or motives ; that 
those motives are the results of some antecedents, and 
that, therefore, if we were acquainted with all the laws 
of their movements, we could with unerring certainty 
predict the whole of their immediate results. This, un- 
less I am greatly mistaken, is the view which must be 
held by every man whose mind is unbiased by system 
and who forms his opinions according to the evidence 
actually before him. If, for example, I am intimately 
acquainted with the character of any person, I can fre- 
quently tell how he will act under some given circum- 
stances. Should I fail in this prediction, I must ascribe 
my error not to the arbitrary and capricious freedom of 
his will, nor to any supernatural prearrangement, for of 
neither of these things have we the slightest proof, but 
I must be content to suppose either that I had been mis- 
informed as to some of the circumstances in which he 
was placed, or else that I had not sufficiently studied 
the ordinary operations of his mind. If, however, I 
were capable of correct reasoning, and if, at the same 
time, I had a complete knowledge both of his disposi- 
tion and of all the events by which he was surrounded, 
I should be able to foresee the line of conduct which, 
in consequence of those events, he would adopt.'' 

Entering then into the problem of ascertaining the 
method of discovering the laws upon which human ac- 
tion is based, Buckle concludes that their existence is 
proven by the regularity of recurrence, and then turns 



INTRODUCTION 11 

to statistics to prove the regularity. He then proceeds 
to say in reference to what those laws are : "If we in- 
quire what those physical agents are by which the human 
race is most powerfully influenced, we shall find that 
they may be classed under four heads, namely climate, 
food, soil and the general aspects of nature; by which 
last I mean those appearances which, though presented 
chiefly to the sight, have, through the medium of that 
or other senses, directed the association of ideas, and 
hence in different countries have given rise to different 
habits of national thought." 

Here we have the first scientific attempt to write 
history on the theory of materialism, that is upon the 
theory that the ideas are not the original motive power 
in history, but that thoughts and ideas are themselves 
an effect and not a primitive cause. According to 
Buckle they are the product of natural surroundings; 
it is nature and natural characteristics which influence 
thought and mould the action of man. B'uckle writes 
history on the theory that the human mind is not the 
free agency which it was thought to be before, but that 
it is directed by external forces. So far the most 
modern sociologists agree with him, but as to what 
these forces are, they do not agree with him. For, 
while it would be quite possible to explain upon this 
theory the differences between the characteristics, cus- 
toms and institutions of different countries, the theory 
must prove insufficient for the explanation of the 
changes in one and the same country, where natural sur- 
roundings always remain the same. The theory of 
modern historic materialism is, that the mode and man- 
ner of providing the means of subsistence, food, shelter, 
clothing and so forth, in other words, that the mode of 



li LOOKING FORWARD 

production is the directive force in the history of man, 
the most powerful force in creating and shaping socidl 
institutions. Great as the influence jf nature is on 
primitive man, yet in the course of civilization, social 
influence gradually grew to greater- weight and import- 
ance, and man is much more actuated by motives of so- 
ciety than of nature. At the '^ame time, subsistence al- 
ways remained a matter of prime necessity. But the 
manner of providing subsistence changed, and the eco- 
nomic structure of society became the substructure upon 
which all human institutions, moral or physical, were 
built. All mora^., political or social questions resolve 
themselves in the end into economic questions. 

It is frequently said in opposition to this theory that 
it denies the force of moral ideas, but this is not true. 
The power and influence of moral ideas, after they have 
sprung into existence, is not denied at all, but the theory 
changes the relative position of conditions and ideas as 
to tllieir being primarily cause and effect. It maintains 
that, in the order of things, concrete matter existed prior 
to the abstract idea, and that, notwithstanding the force 
o{ moral ideas, there is a force of economic development 
in society working independent of moral ideas, and 
creating conditions, the influence of which is strong 
enough to alter, create and destroy moral ideas. 

The abstract idea of good and bad could never have 
appeared without the previous existence of concrete 
facts or conditions, creating pain or pleasure, and the 
conception of right and wrong must necessarily depend 
on what these facts and conditions are. 

If one were to write a history of the origin and 
development of moral ideas, he would, probably, find 
comparative philology of great assistance to him. He 



I 



INTRODUCTION 33 

would, perhaps, be struck in the outset with some sur- 
prise at the fact that so many languages have one and 
the same word for expressing the abstract idea of good 
and designating concrete things. So in English : good 
and goods, in German : gut, das Gut, die Gueter, in La- 
tin : bonuS; bonum, bona, in Greek : agathos, to agathon, 
to agatha. 

In an article on this subject in "Die Neue Zeit," the 
French writer, Paul Lafargue, points to the Greek word 
nomos, meaning law. Josephus expresses astonishment 
that the word has never been used in that sense in the 
Homeric poems. In those times it meant pasture, later 
on it had the meaning of domicile, and still later of cus- 
tom and law, denoting in its evolution different stages of 
civilization and economic development. 

It may contribute toward a better understanding of the 
idea of historic materialism, if I demonstrate it by some 
illustrations. Among the ancient Hebrews the taking of in- 
terest was immoral, the Pentateuch forbade it. To-day the 
taking of interest is so little averse to our moral senti- 
ment, that courts allow interest on every debt after a 
reasonable time, although no interest is contracted for. 
Orthodoxy considers the Pentateuch as a divinely in- 
spired book. How is it then that our moral sense does 
not object to what the Pentateuch declares to be im- 
moral? When the Mosaic law was given, there was 
neither industrialism, nor commercialism, nor capitalism. 
The system of wages and profit was unknown and money 
or things were borrowed only in cases of actual need 
and^ for purposes of consumption. To-day, most loans 
are business-loans, and in business money is a source of 
profit. The profit-making quality of money has wiped 
out all moral scruples against the taking of interest. In 



14 lyOOKING FORWARD 

order to quiet the religious conscience translators have 
used the word usury where the original speaks of inter- 
est. 

It now remains for me to test the theory and to see 
whether it proves true in the evolution of the State, the 
family and the status of woman. For this purpose I 
will, in as few words as I can, always confining myself 
to what is necessary to support and prove the theory, 
describe the development of social organization together 
with the family and the status of woman, beginning in 
prehistoric times, when our forefathers still lived in a 
state of savagery, and following it up to our own time 
and civilization. I shall endeavor to show the influence 
and effect of economic conditions on the progressive 
changes in the structure of society and social institu- 
tions, as well as the influence of moral ideas, as they 
have sprung from the economic conditions. Much of 
the knowledge which I possess, regarding these things, 
I owe to the study of Lewis H. Morgan's ethnological 
researches, the results of which are published in his book 
^'Ancient Society." 

Most certainly, our knowledge of pre-historic insti- 
tutions, and even of many institutions within historic 
periods, rests on theory only. For, those living at any 
certain time presume a general understanding of their 
institutions and never think of explaining them suffici- 
ently for the understanding of posterity. Therefore, what 
we know of the Grecian and Roman gens is as much a 
hypothesis as what we know of pre-historic group fami- 
lies. But we are not without very strong evidence. It 
consists of customs and usages prevailing at the begin- 
ning of the historic period, and continuing even up to 
the present time; further in ancient myths and legends 



INTRODUCTION 15 

which are always the reflex of actual life, and although 
untrue, are based upon actual facts, beliefs or customs. 
Human phantasy is not able to invent what has not been 
perceived before by the senses. It may exaggerate or 
minimize actual form and action, it may idealize them 
or may be better pleased by the grotesque, but it cannot 
invent something absolutely new. In the description of 
their gods men have never reached beyond the human 
form, and ancient mythologies are nothing but the re- 
flex of human life. 

Another source of evidence are the customs and in- 
stitutions of the aborigines of America, Asia, Africa and 
Australia. Even the most civilized peoples of oui times 
have, ages ago, been in the same condition as these are 
now. As equal causes produce equal eflfects, our insti- 
tutions in those past ages were in all probability similar 
to the institutions of the still existing savages and bar- 
barians. The latter's life is a mirror in which we see 
the reflex of our own life in the past. 

For the purposes of convenience and easy reference, 
I shall follow Morgan also in dividing the time prior to 
civilization into the two periods of savagery and barbar- 
ism, and each of these two periods into three sub-peri- 
ods, namely the lower, the middle and the upper status. 

The lower status of savagery commenced with the 
infancy of the human race and ended with the acquisi- 
tion of a fish subsistence and a knowledge of the use of 
fire. Men subsisted upon fruits and nuts. Articulate 
speech commenced in this period. Each subsequent 
status commencing where the previous one ends, it be- 
comes only necessary to state where the others ended. 

The middle status of savagery ended with the inven- 
tion of the bow and arrow. The Australians and the 



16 I.OOKING FORWARD 

greater part of the Polynesians, when discovered, were 
in this status. 

The upper status of savagery ended with the inven- 
tion of the art of pottery. In this status were a num- 
ber of Indian tribes in the far North-West of the United 
States, when those tribes were discovered. 

The lower status of barbarism ends, in the Eastern 
hemisphere, with the domestication of animals, and in 
the Western with the cultivation of maize and the use 
of the adobe brick. The Indian tribes East of the Mis- 
souri river were in this status. 

The middle status of barbarism ended with the in- 
vention of the smelting of iron. To it belonged the vil- 
lage Indians of New Mexico, Mexico, Central America 
and Peru; in Europe the ancient Britons etc. 

The upper status of barbarism ended with the inven- 
tion of a phonetic alphabet and the use of writing in 
letters or hieroglyphics. To it belonged the Grecian 
tribes of the Homeric age, the Italian tribes shortly be- 
fore the founding of Rome, the Germanic tribes of the 
times of Cesar, etc. 

The upper status of barbarism is followed by the 
period of civilization. 

Our ancestors passed through all these stages and 
were in the upper status of barbarism when they first 
became known to history. Their experience prior to that 
has been lost, and became discoverable only in the insti- 
tutions and customs which existed at the time when the 
light of history first shone upon them. Customs and in- 
stitutions, as a rule, outlive their usefulness and neces- 
sity, but enable us to suppose, with considerable cer- 
tainty, what the conditions were that made them useful 
or necessary. The prehistoric period of the Grecian, 



INTRODUCTION 17 

Roman, and German tribes ends, and their historic 
period begins in the middle status of barbarism. The 
light of history falls back upon times from three to five 
thousand years behind us. The length of the life of the 
human race prior to that is beyond the possibility of 
measurement, and can only be conjectured by geologists. 
How far back social organization dates, we do not 
know; it must already have commenced in the lowest 
stage of savagery. For, even among the aborigines of 
Australia and Polynesia who have not advanced beyond 
the middle status of savagery, there exists a very com- 
plex system of social organization and family relations, 
more complete than most civilized people dream of, and 
which can only be the product of development, running 
through immense lengths of time. I use the term social 
organization in contradistinction to political organization, 
the former resting on personal relations, the latter on 
territory. The first is earlier in the order of time, for 
no political organization, no state government was pos- 
sible before a tribe had settled down upon a definite ter- 
ritory and commenced village life, and even after that 
the social organization lasted for a long time, until politi- 
cal organization was invented. In fact, the political or- 
ganization or state founded upon territory, is a very late 
invention in the course of human progress ; among Euro- 
pean nations it is not older than about twenty-five hun- 
dred years. It was, in Europe, first established in Greece 
toward the end of the fifth or the beginning of the sixth 
century before Christ by the legislation known as that of 
Cleisthenes, who divided Attica into one hundred demoi, 
a kind of town or township. The town or township, that 
is, a certain area of territory, is the unit of the state, but 
the unit of social organization was the gens, which was 



18 I^OOKING FORWARD 

a congregation of individuals. The gens was the unit of 
the Roman social organization until the Romans formed 
a political organization. Of course, it must not be sup- 
posed that all peoples and tribes upon earth called the 
unit of their organization gens. All of them had differ- 
ent names; some perhaps had no name at all for it; but 
it was everywhere the same, or nearly the same, in char- 
acter and function, and the name gens is used by me for 
all of them. The Roman gens existed within the his- 
toric period, and even the greatest and most learned his- 
torians never understood clearly its nature until Morgan, 
who made his researches among the American Indians, 
showed the analogies between their social organization 
and that of the ancient Grecians and Romans. The gens 
rests upon the principle of kinship and had its beginning 
in family relations. Like all human institutions, it has 
run through a long course of evolution, but, for the pur- 
poses of this book, I need not farther dwell upon this 
point. 

The gens (pi. gentes) was, as already mentioned, an 
organization resting on personal relations. A number of 
gentes formed a phratry, as the Grecians, or a curia, as 
the Romans called it ; and a number of phratries formed 
the tribe. Sometimes the tribes attained to the forma- 
tion of a nation or a confederacy as the Hebrews, the 
Grecians, the Romans, the Iroquois Indians, etc., in other 
cases they never came to that. 

It is quite difficult for us to conceive of and compre- 
hend an organization based upon personal relations only, 
and having no relation whatever to the territory inhab- 
ited, because it is entirely unsuitable to the modern sys- 
tem of industry, trade and commerce, and particularly sO; 
to the modern system of private ownership in land. But 



INTRODUCTION 19 

it was suitable to the conditions prevailing in ancient 
times, or is suitable to the conditions prevailing among 
peoples who have not yet reached our stage of civiliza- 
tion. 

The Athenian nation consisted of four tribes, each 
tribe had three phratries and each phratry thirty gentes, 
so that the Athenian nation consisted of three hundred 
and sixty gentes. The number of individuals in a gens 
varied, but each Athenian had his name inscribed in the 
rolls of a gens. The members of a gens had a common 
name, which was the name of a supposed common ances- 
tor. (Among the Indians and other savages or barbar- 
ians the name was or is generally that of an animal ; the 
figure of it, or any other figure representing the sup- 
posed ancestor, was or is usually used as a symbol or 
totem.) 

The other characteristics of the gens were that its 
members had a common place of worship, a common 
place of burial, and usually utilized the land in common. 
They practiced common religious rites, they possessed 
mutual rights of succession to the property of deceased 
members, they were under reciprocal obligations of help 
and defense, had arrangements for the redress of wrong, 
frequently by the way of blood-revenge, and elected their 
chiefs. 

The members of a gens considered themselves as 
blood-relatives, although they were not always actually 
such, wherefore marriage within the gens was forbidden. 
In the beginning of this form of organization the chil- 
dren belonged to the gens of the mother, and descent 
was in the female line. The reasons for this as well as 
for the change, I will state in connection with the his- 
tory of the family. But while this system of maternal 



80 WOKING FORWARD 

descent lasted, the position of the woman was probably a 
superior one, and there prevailed among many tribes 
what I. I. Bachofen calls a system of ''Mutterrechf 
(mother-right) a gynecocracy. The change took place 
on account of the development of property, and after- 
ward the children belonged to the father's gens, and de- 
scent was in the male Hne. 

From what we are able to learn of the functions of 
the phratry, it is almost impossible to say what they were. 
It seems, however, that they were not of a governmental 
nature but rather of a religious and military character. 
They probably manifested themselves at the burial of the 
dead, at public games, at religious festivals and at coun- 
cils of the people where the grouping of chiefs and peo- 
ple would be by phratries rather than by gentes. There 
is also some evidence that they were of military im- 
portance. 

The gentes, the phratries and the tribes had their 
chiefs and leaders, upon whom devolved military as well 
as priestly duties. They often assembled in council, but 
the final decision rested with the general assembly of the 
people. 

This form of government existed among the Grecians 
and Romans up to and within the historic period. There 
is plenty of evidence that it existed among the ancient 
Teutons. The Irish sept and the Scottish clan were, in 
all probability, originally gentes. The fact that in China 
villages can be found in which all the inhabitants bear 
the same family name is probably proof that the same 
organization prevailed in ancient times among the 
Chinese; the Hebrew mishpaka (family) was probably a 
gens, and the beth ab (father's house) a phratry. In 
Numbers, Chap. 3, v. 14-20, relating the counting of the 



INTRODUCTION 31 

children of Levi we find among 22,300 male persons not 
more than eight family names. The same kind of organi- 
zation still exists among the aborigines of America ; there 
is ample proof that it existed among the Aztecs and 
Incas; it exists among the aborigines of Australia, and 
undoubtedly this form of government appeared and dis- 
appeared among all peoples with the growing into and 
the growing out of certain stages of civilization. 

As to the causes which led to the transformation of 
the gentile organization into the political organization, 
we can learn them best from the history of Athens, be- 
cause the final change took place within the historic per- 
iod, as already remarked. Studying the legislation of 
Theseus and Solon, we find that the economic conditions, 
then existing, had fully outgrown the old organization. 
Private ownership in land had graduallv become estab- 
lished, trade and commerce had developed and grown, 
the ancient communistic customs had more or less disap- 
peared, the influx of strangers created a class of inhab- 
itants that stood outside the social organization and, con- 
sequently, had no part whatever in the government, some 
of the people became rich, others remained poor, and 
with this the economic class made its appearance. The 
old organization gradually became incompatible with the 
new conditions. The real cause of the resulting evils, 
however, was not discovered until the nation had experi- 
mented through hundreds of years with all sorts of 
reform. (This fact will give us food for reflection when 
we compare the situation with the economic situation of 
our time.) The existence of economic classes first found 
expression in the legislation of Theseus. By this the peo- 
ple were divided into three classes, irrespective of the 
gentes, namely the Eupatridae, or well born; the Geo- 



22 LOOKING FORWARD 

miori, or husbandmen, and the Demiurgi or artisans. 
The principal offices were assigned to the first class. The 
classification recognized property and the aristocratic ele- 
ment. If in modern legislation, especially under repub- 
lican institutions, class-distinctions are not recognized, 
such is not evidence of their non-existence, but of the 
strength of economic influences, which is great enough 
not to need such recognition for its support and main- 
tenance. 

After the legislation of Theseus came that of Draco. 
then that of Solon, and then that of Cleisthenes, who 
created a government based on territory and property in 
place of the one based upon personal relations. The ter- 
ritory of the nation was divided into one hundred dis^ 
tricts called demoi, with local governments. The class- 
distinctions in the general government were retained. It 
was the first European state-government. Simple as the 
organization of the state appears to us, the idea did not 
occur to the Athenian people before they had wrestled 
with the subject through several centuries. Is it not 
probable that, at some future time, the historian will 
express his astonishment at the difficulties which we 
encountered in solving problems which will appear quite 
simple then? 

After the creation of the Athenian state, the old gen- 
tile organization, of course, ran along with the new or- 
ganization for some time. But being deprived of all act- 
ual functions, it became more and more meaningless and 
gradually died out, leaving its traces, however, in many 
customs, usages and institutions. 

Turning now to the growth and development of the 
family, I shall again follow Morgan whose researches 
seem to me to be deeper and whose conclusions to be 



INTRODUCTION 23 

riper than those of any other ethnologist, Lubbock and 
McLellan included. From the historical standpoint, and 
principally that of evolution, the latter's theory of exo- 
gamy and endogamy seems to me quite unsatisfactory. 

Morgan says : 'The stages of the growth of the fam- 
ily are embodied in systems of consanguinity and affinity, 
and in usages relating to marriage, by means of which, 
collectively, the family can be definitely traced through 
several successive forms." The monogamian family, that 
is the present form, prevailing among all civilized 
nations, is the fifth in the succession of a number of 
forms. It is founded upon the marriage of one man 
with one woman, with an exclusive cohabitation, the lat- 
ter constituting the essential element of the institution. 

The preceding four forms of the family are as fol- 
lows : 

First: The consanguine family. 

It was founded upon the intermarriage of brothers 
and sisters in a group. Evidence still remains in the 
oldest of existing systems of consanguinity, the Malayan, 
tending to show that this, the first form of the family, 
was anciently as universal as this system of consanguin- 
ity which it created. 

Second: The Punaluan family. 

Its name is derived from the Hawaian relationship of 
Punalua, (emphasis on the second syllable). It was 
founded upon the intermarriage of several brothers to 
each other's wives in a group; and of several sisters to 
each other's husbands in a group. But the term brother 
as here used, included the first, second, third and even 
more remote male cousins, all of whom were considered 
brothers to each other, as we consider own brothers ; and 
the term sister included the first, second, third and even 



24 I^OOKING FORWARD 

more remote female cousins, all of whom were sisters to 
each other, the same as own sisters. This form of the 
family supervened upon the consanguine. It created the 
Turanian system of consanguinity. Both this and the 
previous form belong to the period of savagery. 

Third. The Syndiasmian family. 

The term is from the Greek word meaning to pair. 
It was founded upon the pairing of a male with a female 
under the form of marriage, but without an exclusive 
cohabitation. It was the germ of the monogamian fam- 
ily. Divorce or separation was at the option of both^ 
husband and wife. This form of the family failed to 
create a system of consanguinity. 

Fourth : The patriarchal family. 

It was founded upon the marriage of one man to sev- 
eral wives. It was the family of the Hebrew pastoral 
tribes, the chiefs and principal men of which practiced 
polygamy. Undoubtedly it prevailed also among other 
Semitic tribes than the Hebrew. It exercised but little 
influence upon human affairs for want of universality. 
It is found exclusively among pastoral peoples. 

Morgan spent most of his life among the Iroquois 
Indians, into one of whose tribes he caused himself to 
be adopted, studying their customs and institutions. He 
found among them a system of consanguinity and affinity 
entirely inconsistent with the form of their family. The 
latter was the Syndiasmian, and in reference to relation- 
ships arising out of it, there could be no doubt who was 
father, mother, son, daughter, brother or sister. Yet, the 
Iroquois Indian not only calls his own children his sons 
and daughters, but also those of his brothers, and the 
children of his brothers call him father. The children 
of his sisters, however, he calls his nephews and nieces. 



INTRODUCTION 25 

and they call him uncle. The Iroquois woman calls the 
children of her sisters her sons and daughters, just as 
her own, and they call her mother; but the children of 
her brother are her nephews and nieces, and they call her 
aunt. Furthermore, the children of brothers call each 
other brothers and sisters, as do the children of sisters, 
but the children of a brother call the children of his sis- 
ter cousins, and likewise do the children of a sister call 
the children of her brother cousins. And they do not 
only call each other so, but treat each other according 
to this expressed relationship, and build their entire sys- 
tem of consanguinity and affinity upon it. 

The same system of consanguinity and affinity and 
its inconsistency with the prevailing form of the family 
exists among all the Indians and among many tribes in 
the East Indies and in Hindostan, and partially it exists 
among the African and Australian tribes. 

Now, the form of the family which was still existing 
during the first part of the nineteenth century among the 
Kanakas, the original inhabitants of Hawaii, would cre- 
ate exactly the system of consanguinity existing among 
the Indians, it would create exactly such fathers, moth- 
ers, brothers and sisters. But, remarkable to say, the 
system of consanguinity prevailing among the Kanakas 
was different from that described and also inconsistent 
with their form of family. Among the Hawaiians the 
children of a man call the children of his brothers and 
of his sisters their brothers and sisters, that is to say the 
relationship which we call that of cousins, does not exist, 
but they are all brothers and sisters. Equally unknown, 
of course, is the relationship of uncle and aunt, nephew 
and niece. This system of consanguinity, called the 
Malayan system, is found, generally, in Polynesia, but 



26 IvOOKING FORWARD 

nowhere exists a form of family which corresponds to 
it. It must, therefore, be concluded that it is the pro- 
duct of a form of the family which has become extinct 
We are enabled, however, to construe this form of the 
family out of the system of consanguinity which we find, 
but which does not harmonize with any of the families 
existing. 

The reason why systems of consanguinity are untrue 
to the forms of the family together with which they ex- 
ist, is to be found in the fact that the form of the family 
advances faster of necessity than systems of consanguin- 
ity which follow to record the family relationships. And 
it must not be supposed that the types of the family men- 
tioned are separated from each other by sharply defined 
lines; on the contrary, the first passes into the second, 
the second into the third, and so forth. One has suc- 
cessively sprung from the other, and they represent col- 
lectively the growth of the idea of the family. 

. Three of the forms mentioned, the consanguine, the 
punaluan and the monogamian family were radical, 
because they were sufficiently general and influential to 
create three distinct systems of consanguinity, all of 
which still exist in living forms. The remaining two, 
the syndiasmian and the patriarchal were intermediate, 
and not sufficiently, influential upon human affairs to 
create a new, or modify essentially the then existing sys- 
tem of consanguinity. 

It will now be in order to describe these diflferent 
forms of the family. 

I. The consanguine family. 

It is the first and most ancient form of the institution 
and has ceased to exist even among the lowest tribes of 
savages. Its existence is proven, however, by the Ma- 



INTRODUCTION 27 

layan system of consanguinity and affinity which has out- 
Hved for innumerable centuries the marriage customs in 
whicl^ it originated, and which remains to attest the fact 
that such a family existed when the system was formed. It 
exists among the Hawaiians and other Polynesian tribes. 
Under this system there are five categories of blood-rela- 
tionship, into which all blood-relatives, near or remote, 
are classified. Speaking as a Hawaiian, the children of 
my brother are my children also, their children also my 
grandchildren; it is the same with my sister's children. 
In addressing the wives of my brothers, I call them also 
my wives. My father's brother is my father, my grand- 
father's brother also my grandfather. All the children 
of my father's brothers and sisters are my brothers and 
sisters and so forth. Uncles, aunts, nephews, nieces, 
cousins are unknown. 

This system of relationship is found not only in Ha- 
waii, but also among the Maoris of New Zealand, among 
the Samoans and on many islands in the Pacific ocean. 
It does not correspond with the form of family prevail- 
ing among them now. 

The fact that as a Hawaiian I call my brother's wives 
also my wives, and that, speaking as a female, I call my 
sister's husbands also my husbands, that the children of 
all my brothers and sisters are called by me my children, 
and so forth, proves the existence of a family in which 
this relationship existed, not only in name, but in fact, 
and that it must have been a family, consisting of a num- 
ber of natural brothers and sisters, married in a group, 
so that all the brothers together were the husbands of 
all the sisters together. This is the only imaginable form 
of the family that could produce the Malayan system of 



38 IwOOKING FORWARD 

relationship. (I will show later on, that Morgan is prob- 
ably' mistaken as to that.) 

The consanguine family was the first organized iovm 
of society, and necessarily an improvement upon the 
previous unorganized state, whatever that may have 
been. 

2. The Punaluan family. 

This family has existed in Europe, Asia, and Americsi 
within the historical period, and in Polynesia within the 
last century. Morgan says: With a wide prevalence in 
the tribes of mankind in the status of savagery, it 
remained in some instances among tribes who had 
advanced into the lower status of barbarism, and in one 
case, that of the Britons, among tribes who had attained 
the middle status. 

The transition from the consanguine family into th^ 
Punaluan family was produced by the gradual exclusion 
of own brothers and sisters from the marriage relatioiii 
the evils of which could not forever escape human obser* 
vation. 

Under the Hawaiian system of consanguinity a man 
calls his wife's sisters his wives, not only her own siS' 
ters, but also her collateral sisters, that is the daughters 
of her mother's sisters and her cousins in remoter 
degrees. But the husband of his wife's sistei he calla 
punalua, i. e., his intimate friend or companiovi. This 
word has been used by Morgan to give a name to this 
form of family. The husbands of the several sisters of 
his wife he calls also punalua. They were jointly inter- 
married in the group. These husbands were, probably, 
not brothers, if they were, the blood relationship would 
naturally have prevailed over the affineal, but their wives 
were sisters own and collateral. In this case the sister- 



INTRODUCTION 29 

hood of the wives was the basis upon which the group 
was formed, and their husbands stood to each other in 
the relationship of punalua. In the other group which 
rests upon the brotherhood of the husbands a woman 
calls her husband's brother her husband. All the brothers 
of her husband, own as well as collateral, that are sons 
of his father's brothers or cousins in second, third or 
remoter degree, were also her husbands. But the wife 
of her husband's brother she calls punalua, and the sev- 
eral wives of her husband's brothers stand to her in the 
same relationship of punalua. These wives were, prob- 
ably, not sisters of each other, for the reason stated in 
the other case, although exceptions doubtless existed 
under both branches. All these wives stood to each 
other in the relationship of punalua. 

The punaluan family was a group family like the 
consanguine. While the consanguine family consisted 
altogether of brothers and sisters, in the punaluan family 
a number of brothers were in the beginning married to 
a number of sisters, not their own, in a group, and later 
on^ only one part of the family, either the male or the 
female part, consisted either of brothers or sisters. 

Even if we had not discovered this family in actual 
existence in the last century, proof of its former preval- 
ence would be the Turanian system of consanguinity 
and affinity, just as the Malayan system of relationship 
is proof of the existence of the consanguine family. 

Traces of the punaluan custom remained here and 
there, down to the middle period of barbarism, in excep- 
tional cases in European, Asiatic and American tribes. 
The most remarkable illustration is given by Cesar in 
stating the marriage customs of the ancient Britons. He 
observed that by tens and twelves husbands possessed 



30 



I.OOKING FORWARD 



their wives in common, and especially brothers with 
brothers, and parents with their children. As to the lat- 
ter he was certainly mistaken. 

The most positive proof of the existence of this form 
of the family is the Turanian system of consanguii.ity 
and affinity which prevails in about seventy American 
Indian tribes, in South India among the Hindoos, in a 
part of North India, also partially in Australia; traces 
of it have been found in part of Africa, but the system 
of the African tribes approaches nearer the Malayan; it 
certainly was universal among the North American abor- 
igines and has been traced sufficiently among those of 
South America to render probable its equally universal 
prevalence among them. 

It recognizes all the relationships under the Aryan, 
that is the modern system, besides an additional number 
unnoticed by the latter. No other system of consan- 
guinity, found among men, approaches it in elaborate- 
ness of discrimination or in the extent of special char-^ 
acteristics. It recognizes relationships for which mod- 
ern languages have no names, it distinguishes between 
brothers and sisters as to their age. So for instance, the 
relationship between me and my older brother bears a 
different name from that between me and my younger 
brother. For many relationships which we can only des- 
ignate descriptively, it has special names, as for my 
mother's mother's sister's great-great-granddaughter, or 
my fathers' fathers' fathers' sister's daughter's daughter. 
It is called Turanian after the part of Asia called Turan. 
The wonder is how savages and barbarians could work 
out and use such an elaborate system with such a rich 
nomenclature. It is certainly bewildering and confusing 



INTRODUCTION 31 

to US. Its existence is proof of the punaluan family be- 
cause no other family could produce the system. 

But while the punaluan family went out of existence, 
the system of relationship continued to last, and its terms 
were used and still are used among nations and tribes 
among which the subsequent family prevails, namely the 
Syndiasmian. 

3. The Syndiasmian family. 

When the American aborigines were discovered, that 
portion of them who were in the lower status of barbar- 
ism had attained to the syndiasmian or pairing family^ 
This family was special and peculiar. Several of them 
were usually found in one house, the so-called long 
houses, forming a communal household, in which the 
principle of communism in living was practiced. In 
many instances these households were presided over by 
the mother (perhaps under the system which Bachofen 
calls motherright). Morgan is of the opinion that the 
fact of the conjunction of several such families in a com- 
mon household is of itself an admission that the family 
was too feeble an organization to face alone the hard- 
ships of life. Nevertheless it was founded upon mar- 
riage between single pairs, and possessed some of the 
characteristics of the monogamian family. The woman 
was now something more than the principal wife of the 
husband, she was his companion, the preparer of his 
food, and the mother of children whom he now began 
with some assurance to regard as his own. 

Marriage, however, was not founded upon sentiment 
but upon convenience and necessity. It was left, in effect, 
to the mothers to arrange the marriages of their children, 
and they were negotiated generally without the knowl- 
edge of the parties to be married, and without asking 



32 lyOOKING FORWARD 

their previous consent. The relation, however, contin- 
ued during the pleasure of the parties and no longer. It 
is for this reason that it is properly distinguished as the 
pairing family. The husband could put away his wife 
at pleasure and take another without offense, and the 
woman enjoyed the equal right of leaving her husband 
and accepting another, wherein the usages of her tribe 
Vv^ere not infringed. But a public sentiment gradually 
formed and grew into strength against such separations. 
When alienation arose between a married pair, and their 
separation became imminent, the kindred of each at- 
tempted a reconciliation of the parties, in which they 
were often successful ; but if they were unable to remove 
the difficulty, their separation was approved. The wif^ 
then left the home of her husband, taking with her their 
children, who were regarded as exclusively her own, and 
her personal effects, upon which her husband had no 
claim; or, where the wife's kindred predominated in the 
communal household, which was usually the case, the 
husband left the home of his wife. Thus, the continu- 
ance of the marriage relation remained at the option of 
the parties. Such were the usages of the Iroquois and 
many other Indian tribes. Among the village Indians 
in the middle status of barbarism the facts were not 
essentially different, so far as they can be said to be 
known. A comparison of the usages of the American 
aborigines with respect to marriage and divorce shows 
an existing similarity sufficiently strong to imply original 
identity of usages. Usages similar to those prevailing 
among the Iroquois and other Northern tribes are 
reported by Spanish writers as having prevailed among 
the Aztecs and the Peruvians. 

In all probability the Syndiasmian family sprang 



INTRODUCTION 33 

from the Punaluan simply in this way that although the 
latter was founded upon group marriage, yet single 
pairs did for mere individual reasons prefer each other, 
so that a man had a principal wife among a number of 
wives, and a woman a principal husband among a num- 
ber of husbands, and the tendency in the punaluan fam- 
ily, from the first, was in the direction of the syndias- 
mian. 

Two forms of the family had appealed before the 
syndiasmian, and created two great systems of consan- 
guinity, or rather two distinct forms of the same system, 
but this third family neither produced a new system nor 
sensibly modified the old. The syndiasmian family con- 
tinued for an unknown period of time enveloped in a 
system of consanguinity, false, in the main, to existing 
relationships, and which it had no power to break. This 
was reserved for monogamy, the coming power, able to 
dissolve the fabric. 

The syndiasmian family had no distinct system of 
consanguinity to prove its existence, like its predeces- 
sors ; but such proof is unnecessary, because it has existed 
over large portions of the earth within the historical per-t 
iod, and still exists in numerous barbarous tribes. Among 
the American aborigines in the lower status of barbar- 
ism, it was the prevailing form of the family at the epoch 
of their discovery. Among the village Indians in the 
middle status, it was undoubtedly the prevailing form, 
although the information given by the Spanish writers 
is vague and general. The communal character of their 
joint tenement houses is of itself strong evidence that 
the family had not passed out of the syndiasmian form. 
It had neither the individuality nor the excluslveness 
which monogamy implies. 



34 WOKING FORWARD 

Having now become acquainted with three forms of 
the family which existed prior to the monogamous fam- 
ily, two things are principally to be noted in reference 
to the same. 

First, that these forms existed prior to civilization, 
and upon a stage in the progress of culture when there 
was little property, at least no private property to speak 
of, and the property idea was unknown or in its infancy. 
Especially is this the case as to the consanguine and the 
punaluan family. 

Second, in the group family, of the relation between 
parent and child, only that between mother and child 
can be definitely known, but not that between father and 
child. Nobody can know with certainty who, among 
many fathers, his own father is, nor can one of the hus- 
bands of a number of wives, point out his own children. 
The mother's brother, the maternal uncle, was the near- 
est relative after the mother herself. We have many 
proofs for this. For instance: Chapter 24 of Genesis 
tells us the romance of Isaac and Rebecca. Verse 53 
reads as follows : And the servant brought forth jewels 
of silver, and jewels of gold, and raiment, and gave 
them to Rebecca, he also gave to her brothers, and to 
her mother precious things. Nothing is said of the 
father, of whom we hear nothing but his name. The 
brothers and the mother gave her away, and received 
presents for her. 

Or another instance : Tacitus, speaking of the an- 
cient Teutons, said: The mother-brother considers his 
nephew like his son, some even consider the blood-rela- 
tion between the mother's brother and his nephew holier 
and more binding than that between father and son, so 



INTRODUCTION 35 

that when hostages were demanded, the sister's son was 
considered to give a greater guaranty than the own son. 
Although at the time of Isaac the Hebrews had>, al- 
ready, attained to the patriarchal family, and the Ger- 
mans at the time of Tacitus to the syndiasmian, if not 
the monogamous family, yet these customs prove the 
earlier existence of the group family. They had re- 
mained after the reasons for them had ceased to exist. 
The reason which caused the growth of the monoga- 
mous family out of the syndiasmian, is, according to 
Morgan, as follows: of the two sexes, the male, being 
the physically stronger, most generally procured the ne- 
cessities of life. As civilization advanced and the ac- 
cumulation of property became possible, the property 
idea arose and spread. Whether the property consisted 
of animals or stacks of grain or anything else, as it was 
accumulated by the males or fathers, it was quite natural 
that in course of time they desired that their property 
should go to their own children. This was not possible 
in the group family, it was scarcely possible in the syndi- 
asmian. To accomplish this end a form of the family 
became necessary which enabled a father to distinguish 
his own children from those of other men. The prob- 
lem was solved by the creation of the monogamian 
family. 

*^It is impossible,'' says Morgan, "to overestimate the 
influence of property in the civilization of mankind. It 
was the power that brought the Aryan and Semitic na- 
tions out of barbarism into civilization. The growth of 
the idea of property in the human mind commenced in 
feebleness, and ended in becoming its master passion. 
Governments and laws are instituted with primary refer- 
ence to its creation, protection and enjoyment. It in- 



36 I^OOKING FORWARD 

troduced human slavery as an instrument in its produc- 
tion, and after the experience of several thousand years, 
it caused the abolition of slavery upon the discovery that 
a freeman was a better property-making machine. The 
cruelty inherent in the heart of man, which civilization 
has softened without eradicating, still betrays the savage 
origin of mankind, and in no way more pointedly than 
in the practice of human slavery through all the cen- 
turies of recorded history. With the establishment of 
the inheritance of property in the children of its owner 
came the first possibility of a strict monogamian family. 
Gradually, though slowly, this form of marriage, with 
an exclusive cohabitation, became the rule, but it was 
not until civilization had commenced, that it became 
permanently established. '* 

As finally constituted, this family secured the pa- 
ternity of children, substituted the individual ownership 
of real as well as personal property for joint owner- 
ship, and an exclusive inheritance by children in the 
place of agnatic inheritance. It was a slow growth, 
planting its roots far back in the period of savagery, a 
final result, toward which the experience of the ages 
steadily tended. Although essentially modern, it was 
the product of a vast and varied experience. 

Before proceeding farther in the consideration of the 
monogamian family, I' wish to say a few words concern- 
ing the patriarchal family. I have not more than men- 
tioned it so far. Our principal knowledge of this family 
comes from the Bible. It prevailed principally among 
the ancient Hebrews, but no doubt also among other 
Semitic tribes. It created no system of relationship and 
had no general existence. It belongs to the upper period 
of barbarism and remained for a time after the com- 



I 



INTRODUCTION 37 

mencement of civilization. The chiefs, and perhaps 
others, lived in polygamy, but this was not the special 
characteristic of it. It was the organization of a num- 
ber of persons, bond and free, into a family under pa- 
ternal power, for the purpose of holding lands, and for 
the care of flocks and herds. The chief had authority 
over its members and its property. Those held to servi- 
tude, and those employed as servants lived in the mar- 
riage relation. It was the incorporation of numbers in 
servile and dependent relation, before that time un- 
known, rather than polygamy, that stamped the patriar- 
chal family with attributes of an original organization. 
The nations, among whom it was prevalent, had, as far 
as we know, led at a time, a nomadic life, and it was, 
probably, produced by the peculiarities and the necessi- 
ties growing out of such a life. 

Returning to the monogamian family, we must not 
presume that it was from its beginning the same that it 
is now. It was growing into its present state by degrees. 
Among the Grecians in the Homeric age, as well as 
later on in the historic period, we find that chastity was 
required of the wife only, and that the position of the 
wife in the household as well as in public life was very 
inferior, so much so that hetaerism was, if not approved, 
at least not censured and not considered a violation of 
matrimonial rights. Marriage among the Greeks was 
not grounded upon sentiment but upon necessity and 
duty. These considerations are those which governed 
the Iroquois and the Aztecs; in fact they originated in 
barbarism, and reveal the anterior barbarous condition 
of the ancestors of the Grecian tribes. From first to 
last among the Greeks there was a principle of egotism 
or studied selfishness at work among the males, tending 



38 I^OOKING FORWARD 

to lessen the appreGiation of women, scarcely found 
among savages. It reveals itself in their plan of domes- 
tic life which, in the higher ranks, secluded the wife 
for the purpose of enforcing an exclusive cohabitation, 
without admitting the reciprocal obligation on the part 
of her husband. It implies the existence of an anteced- 
ent conjugal system of the Turanian type, against which 
it was designed to guard. 

All of this has reference to the Athenians. Among 
the Spartans, however, who were far behind the Athen- 
ians in culture and refinement, the position of women 
and the purity of family life were far better than in 
Athens. Which, to say the least, proves that culture 
and refinement alone are not a sufficient agency for the 
elevation of the status of woman and family life. 

In Rome, the condition of women was more favor- 
able, but their subordination the same. Marriage placed 
the wife in the power of her husband. The husband 
treated his wife as his daughter, and not as his equal. 
He had the power of correction, and of life and death 
in case of adultery. Divorce, from the earliest period, 
was at the option of the parties, a characteristic of the 
Syndiasmian family, and transmitted, probably from 
that source. 

Of the domestic life of the ancient Teutons we know 
comparatively little. When they first came into contact 
with the Romans they were in the upper status of bar- 
barism, approaching civilization. Tacitus remarks that 
they almost alone among barbarians contented them- 
selves with a single wife. This points to monogamy. 
The remark that women lived fenced up with chastity, 
and the custom of giving a present in the nature of a 
purchasing gift to the bride, and the severe punishment 



INTRODUCTION 39 

of wives for unchastity permits the conclusion that the 
wife was to a degree the property of the husband. How- 
ever,, as I said, our knowledge of the married life of the 
ancient Germans is too limited to allow any definite con- 
clusions. 

Altogether, we may assume that the monogamian 
family grew in degrees to its present status and that, for 
a long time, it retained customs prevailing under the 
syndiasmian form. 

I have so far followed Morgan, frequently using his 
own words, but I do not agree with all of his hypotheses. 
I do not believe that' it was solely the desire of establish- 
ing fathership with certainty, for the purpose of inherit- 
ance, which led to the growth of the monogamian family, 
because, although connected with property, it would be 
too much of a sentimental reason which, alone, could 
hardly have had such a far reaching influence among 
barbarians. I also do not believe that his description of 
the group family gives us a true and perlect picture of 
these ancient forms of the family. Mr. Morgan believes 
that the organization of gentes was, probably, preceded 
by an organization into marriage classes, such as the 
Australians have, that the object of this organization 
was the prevention of cohabitation between near blood- 
relatives, and that this object was under the gentile or- 
ganization accomplished by the prohibition of marriage 
within the gens. However, the Australian marriage 
classes exist alongside of the gentes (frequently called 
by writers totem-groups), and of the Australian age- 
classes Morgan seems to have had no knowledge what- 
ever. Among the still existing savage peoples, the Au- 
straHans take the lowest rank in point of civilization, 
and their different tribes differ even in degrees. Their 



40 IvOOKING FORWARD 

customs are, therefore, of great interest and importance 
in the study of the development of the human race and 
its institutions. 

Their marriage-classes were known to Morgan, but 
incompletely. To acquaint the reader with them, I will 
describe the social organization of one of the most ad- 
vanced tribes, the Kamilaroi. They are divided into six 
gentes or totem-groups, their names being Duli, Murii- 
ra. Mute, Dinoun, Bilba, Nurai, all being names of ani- 
mals. The first three form a larger group, called Dilbi, 
believed to have a common female ancestor and to stand 
to each other in blood-relationship. The same is the 
case with the other three gentes, except that the name 
of the larger group is Kupathin. They are not allowed 
to marry within their own gens, and formerly they were 
not even allowed to marry within their large group, or 
phratry. 

Irrespective of this organization they are divided into 
four marriage-classes, each of which has a male and a 
female division; these classes are: 

Male. Female. 

1. Ippai. Ippata. 

2. Murri, Mata. 

3. Kumbo, Buta. 

4. Kubbi, Kubbota. 
Each Kamilaroi belongs tO' one of these classes and 

is allowed to marry only one of a definite other class. 
An Ippai can marry only a Kubbota, a Kumbo only a 
Mata, a Murri only a Buta, and a Kubbi only an Ippata. 
The children receive names dififerent from that of 
the mother. The father's name is not considered at all. 
The rule is as fellows: 



INTRODUCTION 41 

The children of an Ippata are always : 

Male. Female. 

Kumbo. Buta. 

Those of a Mata always, Kubbi, Kubbota. 

Those of a Buta, Ippai, Ippata. 

Those of a Kubbota, Murri, Mata. 

Consequently the male division of a class and the 
female division of it stand to each other 'in the relation 
of brothers and sisters. 

The object of this organization was evidently to ex- 
clude own brothers and sisters from marriage. But in 
order to prevent marriage between ancestors and lineal 
descendants, the Australians are divided into age-classes, 
a division of which Morgan, as I said, seems to have 
known nothing. The number of classes, according to 
Heinrich Cunow in "Die Verwandtschafts-Organisa- 
tionen der Australneger'' is three and no one is allowed 
to marry out of his or her own age-class. All those be- 
longing to one age-class call each other brothers and 
sisters, although only few of them are such; but from 
this fact it appears to the unknowing as if marriage be- 
tween brothers and sisters were the rule, although this 
is strictly prevented by the institution of the marriage* 
class and the prohibition to marry within the gens. From 
birth to the period of puberty the Australian belongs to 
the first class, that of children. When puberty arrives, 
and after having gone through certain ceremonies, the 
Australian becomes a "young man," or a "young wo- 
man" and belongs to the second class, the name of 
which signifies young man or young woman. They can 
now marry, and belong to this class until the oldest of 
their children enters it, and then they become "old men," 
or ^*old women" ; that is what the name of the third class 



42 I.OOKING FORWARD 

signifies. The name of his age-class is borne by the 
Austrahan beside the name of his gens and that of his 
marriage-class, so that an Australian has three names, 
each one standing in some relation to the marriage 
rights. His age, according to the number of years he 
has lived, is unknown to the Australian. 

The designations of relationship are taken from the 
division into age-classes, and as the members of each 
class call each other brothers and sisters, and marriage 
being allowed only within the age-class, the same system 
of consanguinity and affinity must be produced which 
was found existing in Hawaii and from which Morgan 
constructed the consanguine family, namely the Malayan 
system of relationship. It may be that the consanguine 
family nevertheless existed prior to the division into 
age-classes, but then its existence would not be proven 
by the Malayan system of relationship, but merely by the 
conjecture that any inhibition proves the previous exist- 
ence of that which is inhibited. Of course, there is a 
possibility that the age-classes are peculiar to the Au- 
stralians and existed nowhere else, but that is something 
which we do not know, and which, probably, will never 
be known. 

Although marriages between members of different 
age-classes are strictly forbidden, yet it may happen 
that a man and a woman, each belonging to another age- 
class stand to each other in the relation of husband and 
wife. For instance, if a wife, having born children, 
dies, and her husband marries another. As soon as the 
oldest of his children enters his, the second class, he in 
turn enters the third, but his second wife, having no 
child old enough to enter the second class, does not 
with her husband enter the third class, but remains in 



INTRODUCTION 43 

the second. Now, all the members of a class always 
call all those of the class immediately above father and 
mother, and they in turn call those of the class below 
sons and daughters. All the members of the first class 
call all the members of the third grandfathers or grand- 
mothers, and the latter in turn call the others grand- 
sons or granddaughters. 

In the case just mentioned, the husband would be- 
long to the class of grandfathers, but the wife to the 
class of mothers, and so it may happen that one not ac- 
quainted with their institutions, may believe that marri- 
age is possible between parent and child. Perhaps, the 
ancient Britons had a similar institution, and it was a 
case of this kind which caused Caesar to say of them 
that parents married their own children. 

The study of the customs and usages of savages is 
a matter of exceeding difficulty, and so it happened that 
when missionaries first came into contact with savages 
or barbarians, they were appalled by what they thought 
to be the sum of human degradation. They were 
shocked by what they saw in reference to the relation 
of the sexes, because they did not understand it. Yet, 
those people acted according to their moral sense and 
observed their customs and usages perhaps more faith- 
fully than we observe ours. Unfaithfulness of a hus- 
band or wife among the Australians is a small private 
affair, but if cohabitation should be had between a man 
and a woman, belonging to a gens within which mar- 
riage is forbidden or between a man and a woman be- 
longing to different classes, between which marriage is 
forbidden, they would be, if, perhaps, not killed, at least 
mercilessly banished from their horde, which would be 
sure death. In their own minds these people are guite 



44 LOOKING FORWARD 

as respectable and modest as we are in ours. Their in- 
stitutions were not understood by the strangers who 
only saw chaos and immorality where everything was 
strictly regulated and regulations were strictly observed. 

In ''the evolution of woman/' the author Eliza Gam- 
ble, says : 'The following fact, however, in regard to 
these races has been observed: the more primitive they 
are, or the less they have come in contact with civili- 
zation, the more strictly do they observe the rules which 
have been established for the government of the sexual 
relations." 

"The men who, with Captain Cook, first visited the 
Sandwich Islands, reported the natives as modest and 
chaste in their habits; but later, after coming in contact 
with the influence of civilization, modesty and chastity 
among them were virtues almost entirely unknown." 

Indeed, there is abundant evidence that wherever 
primitive races came in touch with civilization, they 
were ruined physically and morally. 

But to return to the age-classes of the Australians 
and considering Morgan's assertion that the uncertainty 
of paternity produced the change in the form of family, 
it becomes clear that Morgan's hypothesis is of doubtful 
value. For in the case of the Australians the knowl- 
edge of paternity is a part of their system. How could 
a man be transferred from the second class into the 
third at the time of the puberty of his oldest child, 
unless he knew his child? Shall we presume that the 
institutions of the Australians are peculiar to them, and 
are we compelled to abandon the theory that like causes 
produce like efifects and that the same degree of civili- 
zation always and everywhere produced similar institu- 
tions? Besides, marriage among the Australians and 



INTRODUCTION 45 

Polynesians is generally in single pairs, although they 
stand upon such a low degree of civilization that even 
if we presume the earlier existence of the consanguine 
group-marriage by mere reasoning from inhibitions, the 
changes can not possibly have been produced by the 
desire of passing property down to own children, for 
they have not yet attained to the accumulation of prop- 
erty of any kind or quantity. 

True, their family is not yet monogamous, and 
although knowledge of paternity is a part of their sys- 
tem, yet, paternity is not infrequently uncertain. For 
(and this may be a relic of a former group marriage) 
the older brother very often permits cohabitation of his 
younger brothers with his wife, for which he acquires 
the right in case his younger brothers should marry, to 
cohabit with their wives, and I presume that even in 
such case he considers the children of his wife his own 
children. Yet, as a general rule, fathers know their 
own children, and it is quite doubtful whether uncer- 
tainty of paternity was ever sufficiently general that it 
could have produced a new form of the family. The 
Dieyerie tribe has a form of marriage which comes quite 
near the Punaluan family, only that what the Hawaiian 
called Punalua, the Dieyerie calls Pirauru. It seems to 
be practically a marriage in groups, making certainty of 
paternity im.possible. but it may be that also this form 
of marriage is not yet perfectly understood. 

The reasons for such far-reaching changes, as that 
of descent in paternal line for descent in maternal line 
and for eliminating that status of woman which gave 
her whole power in the communal household and im- 
mense influence in the government of the tribe, so much 
so that ethnologists express the opinion that at a time 



46 IvOOKING FORWARD 

a system of gynecocracy was of general prevalence, as 
well as the reason for the gradual establishment of 
monogamy, must have been principally of an economic 
nature. The sentimental reason sprang up afterwards 
and added force to the economic reason, particularly in 
maintaining the new institution. We shall learn more 
about this, as we proceed. 

The errors into which Mr. Morgan has probably 
fallen, need not concern us any further. They are not 
sufficient to overthrow his general theories, and it is 
not the object of this book to solve ethnological prob- 
lems. It is sufficient for our purposes to know that, 
even in the earliest stages of civilization, there was 
neither chaos nor anarchy in the social or sexual rela- 
tions of man, but that, on the contrary, they were, at 
all times, regulated by system, order and law. Nor do 
Mr. Morgan's errors detract from his merits as a path- 
finder. As yet it has never happened that a scientific 
truth was perfectly and completely evolved by its first 
discoverer. What I intended to demonstrate, what is of 
importance for us to know, and what I wish further to 
show, is: 

First, that human society is a living organism. 

Second, that its beginning dates back perhaps, hun- 
dreds of thousands of years, into the dim ages of lowest 
savagery. 

Third, that the dififerent institutions of human soci- 
ety are interdependent on each other, have either grown 
together, or stand to each other in the relation of cause 
and effect, and that none of them can be fully under- 
stood without knowing them all. 

Fourth, that human institutions cannot in their 
nature be permanent, that they were from their begin- 



INTRODUCTION 47 

ning, and still are, subject to a continous process of evo- 
lution, changing their forms and modes of procedure, 
and even going and coming, according to the necessities 
of the human race. 

Fifth, that, because the prime necessity of animated 
beings is and ever must have been, the means to sup- 
port physical life, and because the first mental efforts 
of man must have been directed toward gaining the 
necessaries of life from physical nature, and considering 
the term necessaries of life as changing its import with 
growing civilization, the efforts of gaining the means 
of subsistence became the power, controlling the human 
intellect. 

Gradually and slowly the human intellect gained a 
knowledge of nature and its forces, which, of course, 
had an earlier existence than he. Man, never living 
singly, and by nature endowed with social instincts, 
learned the advantages of organization. He used both 
toward the betterment of his condition. This grew bet- 
ter, as the procurement of the necessaries of life became 
easier. He shaped his organizations and his rules of 
conduct with a view toward his economic welfare, and 
the manner of producing and acquiring the necessaries 
of life, using the word in its broadest significance, 
became the causa causans, the fountain cause, of all 
human action and all human institutions. 



IL 



The Status of Woman. 



The orthodox Hebrews have an ancient prayer in 
which men thank God for not having created them 
women, and the women thank him for having them cre- 
ated according to his pleasure. This prayer is signifi- 
cant of the status of woman since the beginning of civil- 
ization, up to a comparatively short time ago. There 
was, perhaps, no time in the history of the human race, 
in which the condition of women was more inferior, 
more degraded than in the beginning of the Christian 
era. According to the doctrines of the fathers of the 
Church, the woman was an unclean creature, the tempt- 
ress who brought sin into this world, from whom it was 
considered good. ^n3^ holy to keep away. Did they not 
find proof of it in tfie holy scriptures? Was not man 
first tempted by woman ? Did not God himself command 
that man shall be the lord of woman? If there are any 
books in existence, the authors of which held women 
more in contempt than the authors of the biblical scrip- 
tures and the writings of the fathers of the Church, I 
do not know of them. I may say without fear of con- 
tradiction, that most of what is said about women in 
these ancient books is revolting to our sense of justice, 
decency and morality. I shall not indulge much in quot- 
ing, because it is all too indelicate, and leave it to the 
reader to inform himself. If nature and social condi- 
tions had not been stronger forces than the zelotism of 

48 



the: status of woman 49 

the fathers of the Church, such a thing as the family 
would not exist to-day among Christian nations. "Mar- 
riage/' said Hieronymus, '^is always vicious, wherefore 
nothing can be done but to excuse it and to sanctify it/' 
According to the views of those men, nothing could 
please God more than celibacy and sexual abstinence, 
which according to our modern view would be a gross 
insult to nature. I am sure that I make no mistake, if 
I state that at no time and nowhere, even among savages 
and barbarians, the position of women was, compared 
with that of men^ more inferior than in the Roman 

I empire about twenty centuries ago. Rights they had 

' none and the woman was under tutelage all her life. 

She was born as the property of her father, and became 

\ by marriage the property of her husband. The Roman 

law, however, became the model law for all continental 
Europe. The common law of England which, gener- 

\ ally, followed its own course, independent of the Roman 

law, was, nevertheless, not much more favorable to 
women. 

According to the common law, husband and wife 
become by marriage one person in law. "That is," says 
Blackstone in his commentaries, "the very being or 
legal existence of the woman is suspended during the 
marriage, or at least is incorporated and consolidated 
into that of the husband, under whose wing, protection, 
and cover, she performs everything." In other words, 
husband and wife became one person, but that one per- 
son was the husband. "But though," says Blackstone 
further, "our law in general considers man and wife as 
one person, yet, there are some instances in which she 
is separately considered, as inferior to him, and acting 
by his compulsion. And therefore all deeds executed, 



50 LOOKING FORWARD 

and acts done by her, during her coverture, are void/* 
That is to say that, in the state of marriage, the woman 
had almost no existence at all, so far as rights were 
concerned. Yet, for other purposes, she had a well de- 
fined existence. For, as we further read in Blackstone, 
the husband, by the old law, might give his wife mod- 
erate correction. ^'As he is to answer for her misbe- 
havior, the law thought it reasonable to intrust him with 
this power of restraining her by domestic chastisement, 
in the same moderation that a man is allowed to correct 
his apprentices or children, for whom the master or par- 
ent is also liable in some cases to answer.'' The ground 
upon which this right of correction rested, is certainly 
interesting, for the responsibility of the husband for the 
misbehavior of the wife is no other but a pecuniary one. 
After stating that under the civil law the husband had 
the right to whip his wife, Blackstone continues: ^'But 
with us, in the politer reign of Charles the Second, this 
power of correction began to be doubted; and a wife 
may now have security of the peace against her hus- 
band; or, in return, a husband against his wife. Yet, 
the lower rank of people, who were always fond of the 
old common law, still claim and exert their ancient priv- 
ilege, and the courts of law will still permit a husband 
to restrain a wife of her liberty, in case of any gross 
misbehavior." 

Far up into the period of civilization the husband 
had the privilege of committing adultery at pleasure, 
and the right to kill his adulterous wife. More than 
that the savage and barbarian could not do either. But 
the savage hardly ever did it, while it is questionable 
whether, even to this day, a French or an American 



the: status of woman 51 

jury ever punished a husband for killing his wife when 
h^ caught her in adultery. 

Very far up into the period of civilization, in Greece 
and Rome, the father gave his daughter away in mar- 
riage, whether she consented or not. What more could 
the savage do in this respect? B'ut it never was, nor 
is it customary among savages for parents to compel 
their daughters to marry contrary to their will. 

It may be stated, as a matter of fact, that with the 

beginning of civilization, the condition of women grew 

worse, and that woman was not as free and independent 

I as in the period of savagery. Her condition began to 

improve only very late In the period of civilization. 
I It is, by the way, quite significant that most of our 

j modern languages have no word to designate the human 

I species and for this purpose use the word by which the 

I male is designated. "Man" may mean the human spe- 

cies or a male person ; one has to gather its sense from 
the context. So it is with the French '^homme,'' or the 
Italian "uomo," so it is in many other languages. Even 
in German, which language has a separate word for the 
designation of the species, its gender is masculine. The 
word ''Mensch" can never be used in the feminine. 
If used, however, in the neuter gender, it is a vulgar 
expression, meaning a lewd woman. 

Not unfrequently it is attempted to prove the inferior 
position of women in ancient times, or even in our times 
among savages and barbarians, by the fact that the 
father sold or sells his daughter to her husband. The 
father was, or is paid in cattle or other things, or in 
service. An instance of the latter is to be found in the 
Pentateuch in the story of Jacob, Rachel and Leah. Be- 
fore, here, discussing this point any farther, I deem it 



52 I.OOKING FORWARD 

proper to call attention to the still prevailing custom, 
but more prevailing in Europe than in this country, of 
giving the daughter a dowry, which in most cases be- 
comes the property of the husband. I find it difficult to 
determine whether this is not as much a purchase of 
the husband, as the giving of something to the father 
of the bride is the purchase of the daughter. The only 
material difference which I can see is, that in the one 
case the valuable object of the transaction is the man, 
while in the other it is the woman. And this is really 
significant of the social position of woman; for we will 
find, as a matter of fact, that where the father receives 
something for his daughter, the woman is considered to 
have an economic value, to be practically useful to the 
household, and, in consequence thereof, has a superior 
position within the same. 

Bachofen, as stated before, showed from history, 
legends, myths, customs and usages that there muse have 
been once a period of gynecocracy or matriarchate. A 
description of the conditions prevailing among the most 
advanced Indian tribes on the North American conti- 
nent a hundred years ago, and later still, furnishes a 
picture of what the matriarchate probably was among 
other barbarians. 

The Hurons and Iroquois lived in so-called long- 
houses. Such a house was inhabited by from eight to 
twenty single families, who all of them claimed to be 
the descendants of the same female ancestor. The old- 
est woman in the house directed its affairs. Using the 
word lodge for one of the large families, consisting of 
a number of single families, from ten to fifteen lodges 
formed a totem-group or gens, and from eight to twelve 
of these groups formed the tribe. So we are informed 



THE STATUS OF WOMAN 63 

by Father Gabriel Sagard Theodat in his book "Le 
grand voyage du pays des Hurons/' published in 1632. 
J. W. Powell in his 'Wyandot Government," First an- 
nual report of the Bureau of Ethnology, informs us as 
follows: The land belonged to the tribe. The council 
of chiefs divided the land between the gentes or totem- 
groups according to the numbers of individuals in them. 
Each totem-group then divided its allotment between the 
lodges. From time to time, among the Hurons every 
two years, a redivision took place. The fields were 
fenced in and the parcels of the several lodges were 
designated by some kind of marks. 

It should be noted here that the division of the land 
among the ancient Hebrews must have been quite sim- 
ilar. In Numbers 2(> v. 51-56 we read: "These were 
the number of the children of Israel, six hundred thous- 
and and a thousand seven hundred and thirty. Unto 
these the land shall be divided for an inheritance accord- 
ing to the number of names." (We have noticed already 
the smallness of the number of names.) *To many 
thou shalt give the more inheritance, and to few thou 
shalt give the less inheritance, to every one shall his in- 
heritance be according to those that were numbered of 
him." This clearly proves a division of the land be- 
tween bodies of men according to their numerical 
strength. But the Hebrews had at that time already 
established descent in the male line. 

Quite a similar arrangement is reported to us as 
having prevailed among the Germans at the beginning 
of the Christian era. At that time they, also, had al- 
ready substituted descent in the male line for descent 
in the female line. 

But to return to the Hurons : the work on the fields 



54 LOOKING FORWARD 

was performed exclusively by women, the men assisted 
only in clearing land. In consequence thereof only the 
women possessed the right of usufruction. The women 
directed the use of the land and its products. They also 
directed the affairs of the household, raised the children 
and made the clothing and the household utensils. The 
men provided the class of food obtainable by fishing and 
hunting, built canoes, manufactured their weapons and 
hunting utensils and fought their battles. 

Marriages were always arranged by the mothers or 
the female chiefs of the household. The husband did 
not move into the house of his wife nor she into his. 
He continued to live in the household of his mother and 
staid only temporarily with his wife. If he wished to 
remain in her favor he had to give her regularly a share 
of the fruits of his hunting expeditions. If the two 
could not agree, they were always at liberty to separate. 
So we are told by J. F. Lafitau in his "Moeurs des sau- 
vages ameriquains." The husband had no claim on the 
property of his wife or on his children. They belonged 
to the family of the mother. As her property was 
generally of a kind for which a man had no use, it went 
after her death to her daughters or sisters. If a man 
died, his property did not go to his own sons, but to the 
sons of his sister; if there were none, then to his 
brothers. 

Under such conditions, the women having complete 
control over the fruits of their labor and the necessaries 
of life, and also having complete power in the house- 
hold, they exercised superior influence on tribal affairs. 
Among the Iroquois they took part in the general coun- 
cils; they were, as Lafitau reports, the real authority, 
the soul of the council; they dictated peace or war, ar- 



THE STATUS OF WOMAN 55 

ranged marriages, had control over the children and de- 
termined the manner of descent. Among the Wyandots 
they had the power of appointing the chiefs. Their 
council of chiefs consisted of forty- four women and 
eleven men, each of their eleven totem-groups being rep- 
resented by four women and one man. 

This was the most developed matriarchate of which 
ethnological researches give us knowledge, although 
similar institutions prevailed among other American 
tribes and, also, among the Malayans. However, among 
the latter, it is customary that the new husband moves 
into the family of his wife; it seldom occurs that the 
wife goes with her husband to his kindred. 

According to Rev. Ashur Wright this custom seems 
to have prevailed also among some of the Indian tribes. 
Wright, for many years a missionary among the Sene- 
cas wrote, in 1873, to Morgan in reference to their fam- 
ily system, when occupying the old long-houses, as fol- 
lows: "It is possible that some one clan predominated, 
the women taking in husbands, however, from the other 
clans; and sometimes for a novelty, some of their sons 
bringing in their young wives, until they felt brave 
enough to leave their mothers. Usually, the female por- 
tion ruled the house, and were doubtless clannish enough 
about it. The stores were in common; but woe to the 
luckless husband or lover who was too shiftless to do 
his share of the providing. No matter, how many chil- 
dren, or whatever goods he might have in the house, he 
might at any time be ordered to pick up his blanket and 
budge; and after such orders it would not be healthful 
for him to attempt to disobey. The house would be too 
hot for him, and unless saved by the intercession of 
some aunt or grandmother, he must retreat to his own 



66 IvOOKING FORWARD 

clan; or, as was often done, go and start a new matri- 
monial alliance in some other. The women were the 
great power among the clans, as everywhere else. They 
did not hesitate, when occasion required, '^to knock oflf 
the horn," as it was technically called, from the head of 
a chief, and send him back to the ranks of the warriors. 
The original nomination of the chiefs also always rested 
with them.'' 

In William Alexander's History of Women I find the 
following : ''At what period or by whom the laws of the 
Egyptians were first promulgated, is uncertain, but if 
what has been asserted by some ancient authors be true, 
that the men, in their marriage contracts, promised 
obedience to their wives, (Mr. Alexander had it, prob- 
ably, from ''Egypt," Diodorus, Book I), we may sup- 
pose that the women had no inconsiderable share in 
legislation, otherwise they could hardly have obtained so 
singular a privilege. But singular as this privilege may 
appear, it is yet exceeded by the power of wives in the 
Marian Islands; there a wife is absolutely mistress in 
the house, not the smallest article of which can the hus- 
band dispose of without her permission; and if he 
proves ill humored, obstinate or irregular in his conduct, 
the vvife either corrects, or leaves him altogether, car- 
rying all her movables, property and children along with 
her. Should a husband surprise his wife in adultery, he 
may kill her gallant, but by no means must use her ill. 
But should a wife detect her husband in the same crime, 
they may condemn him to what punishment she pleases, 
and to execute her vengeance, she assembles all the 
women in the neighborhood, who, armed with lances, 
march to the house of the culprit, destroy his grains" etc. 
In the island of Formosa daughters are reg:arded 



THE STATUS OF WOMAN 57 

more highly than sons, because as soon as a woman is 
married, contrary to the customs of other countries, she 
brings her husband home with her to her father's house, 
and he becomes one of the family, so that parents derive 
support and family-strength from the marriage of a 
daughter. 

From the Grecians it is known that in the earlier ages 
women were alowed to vote in the public assemblies, a 
privilege which was afterwards taken from them. 

The Gauls admitted the women to their councils, 
when peace or war was to be debated; and such dif- 
ferences as arose between them and their allies were 
terminated by female negotiation; as a confirmation of 
this we find it stipulated in their treaty with Hannibal, 
that should the Gauls have any complant against the 
Carthagenians, the matter should be settled by the Car- 
thagenian general ; but should the Carthagenians have 
any complaint against the Gauls, it should be referred 
to the Gallic women. 

A confirmation of what Alexander says in reference 
to the women of the Marian Islands can be found in Le 
Freycinet's ''Voyage autour du monde." 

From J. Kubary ''The social institutions of the Pe- 
lewans" we learn that on the Pelew Islands the most 
and hardest labor on the fields is performed by the 
women, that each clan has two chiefs, a male and a 
female one, and that the village-government is in the 
hands of all the chiefs. In case of marriage the husband 
moves into the family of his wife. 

Like the women in the Pelew Islands, those in the 
Marian Islands perform most of the field labor. 

The same custom prevails among many New Zealand- 
ers. Upon the other hand, on the Viti Islands, accord- 



58 LOOKING FORWARD 

ing to Williams and Culvert in "Fiji and the Fijians," 
all the field-work is done by the men, and the position 
of the women is very low; they are cruelly treated by 
their husbands and are absolutely their property. 

On the Tonga Islands women do not participate in 
field labor at all; they have no rights whatever, being 
only little better treated than those on the Viti Islands. 
According to W. Mariner in ''Account of the natives of 
the Tonga Islands" husbands cast off their wives at their 
pleasure, and if a chief dies, some of his wives are 
choked to death. 

According to R. H. Codrington in "Social regulation 
in Melanesia" the women of the Solomon Islands per- 
form most of the agricultural labor, and Rev. G. Turner 
in his "Samoa a hundred years ago and long before" 
tells us that the women are treated better than is usual 
in heathenish tribes. 

Livingstone in his "Missionary travels and researches 
in Southern Africa" speaks of the Bolonda, a negro 
tribe living on the Zambesi river. They pursue agri- 
culture. Women take part in councils. When they 
marry, the husband must remove to the village of th^ 
wife. When they separate, the children remain with 
the mother. The wife must provide the husband with 
food. If he offends his wife, she punishes him by giv- 
ing him nothing to eat, and no other woman gives him 
anything. 

What fools these heathens and savages are! They 
actually do respect labor, while we, Christians and civil- 
ized men, bombastically profess the respectability of 
labor, but respect those least who perform the most and 
hardest labor, and bow deepest before those who do not 
work at all. 



THE STATUS OF WOMAN 59 

A full understanding of the customs and social insti- 
tutions of savages and barbarians shows how wrong the 
prevailing opinions in reference to them are. "As 
strength and power are in savage life," reasons Mr. 
Alexander in his aforementioned book, "the only means 
of attaining to power and distinction, so weakness and 
timidity are the certain paths to slavery and oppression. 
On this account we shall almost constantly find women 
among savages condemned to every species of servile or 
rather of slavish drudgery, and shall as constantly find 
them emerging from this state in the same proportion as 
we find the men emerging from ignorance and brutality ; 
the rank therefore and condition, in which we find 
women in one country, mark out to us with the greatest 
precision the exact point in the scale of civil society to 
which the people of such country have attained; and 
were their history entirely silent on every other subject, 
and only mentioned the manner in which they treated 
their women, we would from thence be enabled to form 
a tolerable judgment of the barbarity, or culture of their 

manners." He further says : "In savage life 

women have hardly any mental qualifications; nursed in 
dirt and slovenliness, with but little ornament, and still 
less art in arranging it ; burned with the sun and bedau- 
bed with grease, they excite disgust rather than desire; 
hence they are not so much the objects of love as of 
animal appetite; are seldom admitted to any distinguish- 
ing rank, and as seldom exempted from any distinguish- 
ing slavery They .... the women are by him 

(the man) destined to perform every mean and servile 
office, a fate which constantly attends the weak, where 
power and not reason dictates the law." 

Speaking of the influence of women among the 



60 



lyOOKING FORWARD 



Hurons, Iroquois and other Indians, he says: ^This 
inconsistency of behavior, more or less takes place in 
all nations, and is an incontestable proof that manners 
and customs are everywhere more the offspring of 
chance than of systematic arrangement." 

The superficiality of this reasoning is astounding, 
especially as coming from the author of such an inter- 
esting book as Mr. Alexander's, and' I made these quota- 
tions only, because they are typical of the way people 
generally judge of these things. We shall soon learn, 
however, that manners and customs are not the offspring 
of chance, that, on the contrary, there is system every- 
where, and that the manner of providing the necessaries 
of life has more to do with the status of woman, than 
her physical appearance and the ignorance and brutality 
of men. If, among savages, women have to perform 
hard labor, such labor is an economic necessity. If in 
the wanderings of an Australian horde the women carry 
the babies and the belongings, they do it, because the 
men cannot do these things and hunt for food at the 
same time. If among Arabian and other tribes the 
custom of infanticide prevailed, it was on account of a 
lack of food. But it is certainly the height of absurdity 
to measure the beauty of savage women with the eye 
of civilized man, and to assume that the savage man 
does the same, and that he does it with the aesthetic 
sentiment of civilization. Presumably savage women 
would not bedaub themselves with grease without the 
knowledge of thereby pleasing their male companions. 

I might considerably increase the number of illustra- 
tions of the status of woman prior to the period of civi- 
lization, but I deem the foregoing sufficient, and will, 
in addition, only quote from Tacitus' Germania in refer- 



THE STATUS OF WOMAN 61 

ence to the ancient Germans: "When they are not in 
war, they spend their time hunting, oftener doing noth- 
ing but eat and sleep. The care of house and hearth 
and of the fields was left to the women, the aged, that 

is, the weakest of the family." "A dowry is not 

brought by the wife to the husband, but by the husband 
to the wife" *The fields are taken by the com- 
munities according to the number of the tillers" 

"In them (noble virgins) they see something holy and 
prophetic, and for this reason do not refuse their advice, 
and leave their words not unobserved." 

No trace of matriarchal institutions appears among 
tribes that had not yet attained to the tilling of the soil, 
were not domiciled and not sufficiently advanced to ac- 
cumulate some property. None of it can be found 
among pastoral nations. The Australians who roam 
through the bush in hordes and oftener suffer hunger 
than have an overplus of food, treat their women kindly, 
but always finding it difficult to obtain a suitable wife 
within the horde on account of the many inhibitions 
spoken of before, steal or exchange women for the pur- 
pose of marriage, and the wife almost invariably fol- 
lows the husband into his horde. 

Matriarchal institutions seem to have had their be- 
ginning toward the end of the lower status of barbarism 
and to disappear sometime in the middle status, per- 
haps late in that status, leaving traces of their existence 
behind. It is, of course, not to be presumed, that they 
disappeared suddenly; the transformation was certainly 
slow and gradual. Their duration in years we do not 
know, it may have been hundreds or thousands. Our 
historical knowledge does not go behind the upper status 
of barbarism, and those tribes, of whom we gained 



62 LOOKING FORWARD 

knowledge by the discovery of new continents did not 
farther develop their institutions independently and free 
from contact with civilization. 

The economic conditions under which matriarchal 
institutions prevailed were these : Permanent domicile 
of the tribe, cultivation of the soil to some extent, solely, 
or principally, by women, and the practice of hunting 
by men, also the manufacture of household utensils by 
women exclusively, and the possibility of accumulating 
some property. 

Wherever the women materially assisted in the pro- 
duction of the necessaries of life, as on the Pelew Island, 
the Marian Islands etc. or among the Hurons, they were 
well treated and enjoyed a superior position; but wher- 
ever they contributed nothing material toward the ne- 
cessary labor for subsistence, as on the Viti or the Ton- 
ga Islands, their position was quite inferior and they 
were not unfrequently brutally treated. 

With domiciliation or localization and the cultivation 
of the soil the possibility of a more rapid increase of 
population was given; with the gradual extension of 
agriculture and raising of domesticated animals, hunting 
as a pursuit for obtaining food and other necessaries 
became more and more unnecessary; with the improve- 
ment of tools and the growth of skill the quantity of 
manufactured things increased, and exchange of them 
between different groups or tribes sprang up. In course 
of time the making provision for the support of the 
family became the exclusive business of the males, while 
the women were limited to household work. Contempo- 
raneously with the limitation of the sphere of their ac- 
tivity and their value as producers of the necessaries of 
life, their power and influence waned. It was altogether 



THE STATUS OF WOMAN 63 

an economic process; there were no sentimental reasons 
for it. Certainly, sentiment changed, but the change of 
sentiment was the consequence of the change of eco- 
nomic conditions. Sentiment is never an original cause, 
it is always created by conditions; but after its creation 
it may become a powerful factor in movements toward 
a transformation of conditions that have become op- 
pressive. The Mosaic law commanded the return of the 
pawn, for money borrowed, on the evening of the day 
on which it was given. The moneylender of to-day, 
even if he be an orthodox Hebrew, would ridicule the 
idea. We live under different economic conditions and 
our sentiments correspond with these conditions. Christ 
drove the money-changers from the temple; in our days 
the banker is one of the most honored and respected 
personages. Has moral sentiment declined with civili- 
zation, or was moral conception of a higher grade two 
and three thousand years ago, than it is now? I am 
rather inclined to believe that if department stores, in- 
dustrial corporations and stock-exchanges were older 
than the Hebrew law, the latter would have been dif- 
ferent from what is was, and the money-changers would 
have had the front seats in the temple. 

Up to modern times the economic conditions not 
only remained unfavorable to women but grew so even 
more. Century after century passed, but women re- 
mained without power and influence, at least among the 
classes who shaped legislation and institutions, because 
the economic conditions were such that woman was not 
an economic factor in production. 

With the growth of property, the institution of slav- 
ery sprang up. Slavery is not possible where the power 
of production is so small that the worker cannot produce 



64 I.OOKING FORWARD 

more than what is necessary for his own sustenance. 
Perhaps it sounds paradoxical, but it is nevertheless 
true, that slavery, as well as the subjugation of woman, 
was the result of advancing civilization, in so far, at 
least, as this advance consisted in the growth of the 
power of production. I am firmly of the opinion that 
if conditions had not arisen under which the free laborer 
became a better producer than the slave, slavery would 
still be an existing institution, and moral feeling and 
sentiment would sustain it. It would be difficult to 
prove, if possible at all, that the ancient Grecians were 
inferior to us in humane sentiment and moral conscious- 
ness, at least in the classic age, yet they maintained the 
institution of slavery. It was defended even by Aristotle, 
simply because it was, or was believed to be, an eco- 
nomic necessity. At the same time they had little respect 
for women and much less for their wives. I do not 
know of any time and any place, when and where slav- 
ery was co-existent with a superior position of women. 
They were objects of physical admiration, or objects of 
sensual or even soulful admiration, and as such have 
wielded great influence in isolated cases by cabals and 
intrigues, or by the power of their charms, or that of 
genuine aflfection; their beauty and graces have been 
permitted to adorn the home, but they have not exer- 
cised any general power or influence as an integral part 
of the nation or the community. Socially and politically 
woman was held inferior to man. 

Surely, there was between this period and that of 
the matriarchate no diflference in reference to the attrac- 
tion of the sexes toward each other. It is, at least, not 
to be presumed that women had deteriorated in physical 
appearance or intellectual impression, nor that there was 



THE STATUS OF WOMAN 65 

any change in the forces of nature which could have 
caused such a difference. It also can hardly be main- 
tained that the introduction of slavery, or the abrogation 
of institutions which gave woman power and influence 
are in themselves proof of higher culture and greater re- 
finement. Where then is the difference between the 
period of matriarchate and the later period in which 
slavery prevailed, and the power and influence of women 
were gone? It is in this, that in the one period woman 
was economically independent of man, in the other she 
depended on him for support and maintenance. Where, 
in the former period, she was not quite independent, the 
man, at least, depended as much on her as she on him. 
And, economically dependent she remained during 
all the following centuries. Slavery disappeared and 
was superseded by feudalism with its institution of serf- 
dom. It was, in a sense, only a modification of slavery. 
Economically it had the same effect on women as slavery 
had. Household-drudgery extended to weaving and 
spinning, to making soap and brewing beer, and produ- 
cing numerous other things which the house-wife of the 
present day simply orders by telephone. Most of the 
work was done by the wives and daughters of the serfs, 
and no work, the fruits of which belong to another, 
makes the worker economically independent. Nor could 
the work of the serfs make women of the upper classes 
economically independent, because they did not own the 
serfs and were not an economic necessity. Wiomen 
were adored in knightly, romantic fashion, minstrels 
sang their praise, and the baron and the lord bowed 
deeply in reverence to the lady. But all the sometimes 
grotesque gallantry and chivalry only served to demon- 
strate the sentiment that it was the duty of the strong 



66 tOOKING FORWARD 

to protect the weak. It was the poHteness of the super- 
ior toward the inferior, permeated by gross sensuaUty. 
The wife was under coverture, as the law called it, and 
her rights were few, her disabilities many. The poets 
sang of fidelity to the lady in love, but the lady in love 
was quite frequently some other woman than the wife. 

Feudalism was in form and spirit a military institu- 
tion. Such institutions are very apt to produce chivalry 
and cavalierdom, but do not contribute toward the inde- 
pendence and dignity of women; nor can militarism 
grant to women an extensive sphere of influence. 

The economic arrangements and the mode of pro- 
duction in feudal times were these : the peasant serf 
delivered to the landlord the largest part of the prod- 
ucts of the lord's soil and his own toil, and these were 
prepared and shaped for consumption in the home. 
While the serfs were not themselves the property of 
the lord, they were, so to say, a fixture belonging to 
the land, and their labor force, as well as that of their 
families, practically belonged to the lord, who reaped 
the fruits of their labor. For all practical purposes 
they lived in a condition of slavery. 

It seems almost needless to state that the women in 
those times, even those of the upper classes, received 
very little education, and learned almost nothing, ex- 
cept, perhaps, the execution of needle-work. Spending 
almost their whole life within the household, which they 
supervised in a manner pleasing to their lords, it was 
neither thought useful nor necessary for them to know 
anything which had no relation to the household or the 
rearing of children. 

That the life of the peasant woman was one of in- 
cessant toil and servitude may go as self-understood. 



the: status of woman 67 

The laws of inheritance were decidedly against 
woman, for in most cases the estate went to the first- 
born son. But the worst of all of it was the power of 
the lord to dispose of his infant in marriage. ^This/' 
says Blackstone, '^seems to have been one of the greatest 
hardships of ancient tenures. There were indeed sub- 
stantial reasons why the lord should have the restraint 
and control of the ward's marriage, especially of his 
female ward; because of, their tender years, and the 
danger of such female ward's intermarrying with the 
lord's enemy; but no tolerable pretense could be as- 
signed why the lord should have the sale or value of 
the marriage." Speaking then of the origin of that 
right and of the provisions of the charter of Henry the 
First in respect to it, he continues : "But this, among 
other beneficial parts of that charter, being disregarded, 
and guardians still continuing to dispose of their wards 
(the father being in law the guardian of his child) in 
a very arbitrary, unequal manner, it was provided, etc." 

With few exceptions, principally among the many 
petty reigning houses, such was in general the condi- 
tion of women in feudal times. If it was bad in the 
upper classes, it was even worse among the lower. For 
the nobleman directed the marriages among his peasant 
serfs and selected husbands and wives for them accord- 
ing to his pleasure. The daughters of the peasants 
were the easy, because powerless prey of his lordship's 
lust, and there is ample proof that the "jus primae 
noctis" was not a myth. Blackstone does not mention 
it, but his description of the legal status of the serfs is 
sufficient to create the conviction that the right existed 
in England as well as on the continent. "These villeins 
(the word means those holding land by tenure of villen- 



68 I.OOKING FORWARD 

age) belong principally to lords of manors, were 

either annexed to the manor or lord, or to the per- 
son of the lord and transferable by deed from one owner 
to the other. They could not leave their lord without 
his permission, but if they ran away, or were purloined 
from him, might be claimed and recovered by action, 
like beasts or chattels. They held .... small portions of 
land by way of sustaining themselves and families, but 
it was at the mere will of the lord .... and it was upon 

villein services and their services were not only 

base, but uncertain, both as to time and quantity .... 
A villein could acquire no property in land or goods, 
but if he purchased either, the lord might enter upon 
them, oust the villein, and seize them to his own use .... 
In many places also a fine was payable to the lord, if 
the villein presumed to marry his daughter to anyone 
without leave from the lord, (this was probably a later 
substitution for the peculiar right mentioned above. 
The Author.) The lord might also bring an action 
against the husband for damages in thus purloining his 
property. For the children of villeins were also in the 
same state of bondage with their parents." 

Fortunately all human institutions are only transient, 
and feudalism was no exception. In England serfdom 
and villenage were practically done away with at the 
end of the fourteenth century. The suflfering of the 
people caused the risings of Wat Tyler and Flannoc, 
and though the people suffered defeat in the peasant's 
war, yet the worst evils were abolished in immediate 
consequence thereof. But it must not be forgotten that 
the economic conditions, gradually, had also changed 
considerably. Cities had grow^n up and acquired much 
wealth, power and independence; payment in money 



THE STATUS OF WOMAN 69 

had been very extensively substituted for payment in 
kind or service; the landless peasants had, many of 
them, become wage laborers; in the cities the trades in- 
creased; commerce began to flourish and tradesmen and 
artisans became a power. The fear of competition then 
devised the craft guilds. 

The guild system bore the characteristics of feudal 
limes. Class-privileges and power on one side, com- 
pulsory service on the other. The idea of free labor, 
the right of every one to work for his own subsistence 
had not yet entered the human mind. The prevailing 
idea of a proper social order was that of class-govern- 
ment. Labor and service were not conceived as separ- 
able. In the beginning the craft-guilds may not have 
been more than organizations for mutual protection 
against the aggressions of the lords and barons, and it 
may also be that for some time the intention of guard- 
ing the interests of the public against poor and unsatis- 
factory work was more than a mere pretense, but the 
guilds had not been in existence very long when they 
developed into powerful institutions with legal rights 
and privileges, creating class-monopolies. They placed 
checks and restrictions everywhere. The artisan com- 
menced his career as an apprentice, the time of appren- 
ticeship lasting from seven to eight years. During this 
time he was not much better than a slave. When he 
became a journeyman, he was far from being a freeman. 
His civil rights were so few that he could not even 
marry, unless his bride was the widow of a master. He 
was a member of his master's household; but to become 
a master himself was a matter of great difficulty, except 
for masters' sons. He was lucky, if the ''masterpiece," 
intended to bear evidence of his mastership, was ap- 



70 I.OOKING FORWARD 

proved by -the jealous masters. To guard against com- 
petition the guilds fixed the number of masters allowed 
in a city, and the maximum number of apprentices who 
were allowed to learn the trade. Besides that, the fees 
and costs which the journeyman entering mastership 
was required to pay, and the expenses connected with 
the ceremonial initiation were so numerous and large 
that they frequently proved an insurmountable obsta- 
cle. 

There was tyranny everywhere. Quite character- 
istic of the times was a law of Venice which forbade 
artisans to practice their art or craft in foreign coun- 
tries, so as to preserve the secrets thereof and the home 
monopoly. If one v/ent abroad, he was ordered to re- 
turn; if he disobeyed, his nearest relatives were cast 
into prison; and if this did not bring him home, an 
assassin was sent after him, and his relatives were lib- 
erated after his death. 

It must not be supposed that these guilds had 
smooth sailing all the time. In the twelfth and thir- 
teenth centuries it was several times attempted in Ger- 
many by imperial legislation to destroy them, because 
the feudal powers became jealous of them and feared 
them. And, later on, dissatisfaction among the journey- 
men began to grow, and they organized themselves 
openly or secretly for the purpose of resisting the mas- 
ters, but no social or political power was strong enough 
to harm them. No outside force was powerful enough 
to destroy them. Their death came from foes that grew 
within. They themselves created the conditions which 
undermined their existence, and their death was at no 
time nearer than when they and the merchants' guilds 
had reached their highest stage of development and 



THE STATUS OF WOMAN 71 

power. They were destroyed by the force of economic 
conditions which they themselves had brought forth. 
When they had reached their climax the process of self- 
destruction commenced. It was the same process which 
we witness now in regard to the competitive system, 
which is slowly giving way to combination and associa- 
tion. The institution of the guilds became, as I will 
show, an obstacle to its own original purposes and inju- 
rious to the very class which had created it. 

There is abundant evidence that, in their earlier per- 
iod, women were in the crafts as employers as well as 
employees, but it is not diiSicult to understand that the 
fear of competition drove them out. Thereafter no 
women were to be found in the guilds with the excep- 
tion of that of the prostitutes. For, frequently in the 
middle ages the necessity of prostitution was recog- 
nized, the prostitutes were protected by law and organ- 
ized by ordinance and law. 

In Japan, which emerged from feudalism only half 
a century ago, houses of prostitution are to this day 
maintained by the government. 

Wiomen were not allowed to enter the trades. They 
were not accepted as apprentices, and without going 
through the prescribed course of apprenticeship and 
journeymanship, they could not become masters and 
could not establish a business of their own. Thus, a 
woman, unless rich by inheritance, had not a shadow of 
economic independence. Hardly any other avenue of 
life was open to unmarried women, except that of a 
house servant, and they were driven by the thousands 
into vagabondage and prostitution. Perhaps there was 
no time in the history of Europe when vagabondage 
and prostitution had grown to such enormous propor- 



72 I.OOKING FORWARD 

tions as in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. At 
fairs or upon occasions where many men assembled, 
these female vagabonds appeared by the hundreds or 
thousands. The historian tells us that the council of 
Constance, where the pope and the emperor, numerous 
princes, dukes, counts and electors of the German . 
empire, as well as a large number of cardinals, bishops 
and other prelates had assembled, accompanied by their 
large retinues, witnessed the presence of not less than 
fifteen hundred of these women in the city. 

This was at a time when feudalism and serfdom in 
Germany were still in full force. The German peasants' 
war came more than a hundred years later than the 
English, but the power of the cities had already 
assumed large proportions and the numerous guilds 
controlled the economic life therein. The cities, in Eng- 
land, as well as on the continent, by trade and com- 
merce, amassed great wealth, and from that time dates 
the rise of that class which now, in economic parlance 
is designated by the French word bourgeoisie. 

Contemporaneous with the splendor of the cities 
was the misery and degradation of the country people; 
in England after the v/ar of the races, in Germany after 
the thirty years' war. Vagabondage of men and women 
increased to incredible proportions. In Germany it 
was forced upon the populace by the almost complete 
devastation of the country, in England by the discharge 
of the many retainers of the impoverished nobility. 
Nothing can give a better idea of the fearful extent of 
vagabondage than the severity and cruelty with which 
it was attempted to suppress it. 

By an act of parliament it was laid down in 1547 
as law in England that every able-bodied loiterer should 



the; status of woman 73 

be branded with a hot iron and handed over as a slave 
to the person who denounced him. The slave might be 
kept on bread and water, and refused meat or good 
nourishment of any kind; he might be compelled to 
undertake the most filthy task by means of flogging or 
other torture. If he ran away for a fortnight, he was 
condemned to perpetual slavery and to be branded with 
the letter S on his cheek and on his forehead; if he 
ran away again, death as a felon was his doom. His 
master could sell him, bequeath him, or let him like a 
horse or a mule. Death was the punishment of slaves 
who "contrived aught against their masters." When 
one of the vagabonds was caught in the roads by the 
public officers, he was branded with the letter V on his 
chest, and brought back to his birth-place, where he 
must work in chains on the public road. If a vagrant 
gave a false birth-place, he became a slave of the muni- 
cipality, and was branded again. His children became 
the apprentices of the first-comer who wanted them, the 
lads to the age of twenty-four, the girls up to the age 
of twenty. If these poor creatures took to flight they 
then became slaves to their masters, who might put 
them in irons, whip them, put rings around their necks, 
and the like. 

If we were to judge the condition of the people in 
those times from the romantic rubbish written of them, 
we would be forced to believe that their lot was one 
of exalted happiness and serenity, and that life was a 
continuous love-feast. The truth, however, is, that 
these conditions produced debauchery and immorality to 
an almost incredible degree. Even prior to this period 
of vagabondage the manners of the upper classes were 
such that they would shock our sense of decency and 



74 LOOKING FORWARD 

propriety. It was nothing to women of the better classes 
to sit down in the company of half drunken men and 
listen complacently to the vilest stories and jests. Un- 
doubtedly there was much of the romantic in their life, 
if for no other reason, than that the women, having 
many servants, had not much else to do, and did not 
know what else to do, than to indulge in love-afifairs. 
Their education was scanty, their horizon narrow. But 
romanticism has ever been the companion of an inferior 
social position of women. Sensuous adoration took the 
place of true respect. The greater the inequality of 
rights and position, the more romanticism in the rela- 
tion between the sexes. There is a want of common 
interest in matters outside of personal relations. But 
what sort of morals romanticism is apt to produce, how 
it may lower the dignity of man, and inevitably must 
lower the dignity of woman, we may judge, when we 
learn that a prince of Liechtenstein drank the water 
with which his lady-love had washed herself; cities 
maintained houses of prostitution, and conducted visiting 
noblemen of high rank to them as their guests. When 
king Wladislaw of Bohemia visited Vienna in 1452, the 
city authorities sent for his reception a deputation of 
prostitutes, clad in nothing but a dress of thin gauze; 
and worse than that, emperor Charles the Fifth was, on 
the occasion of his visit in Bruges, received by a deputa- 
tion of citizens' daughters, wearing nothing but nature's 
costume. The latter event has been memorialized by the 
great painter Hans Makart in one of his celebrated 
paintings. 

Such was the state of morality in a time when 
women had neither social nor political rights. It is 
quite well for those who fear from the entrance of 



THE STATUS OF WOMAN 75 

women into business pursuits and political life the loss 
of their femininity, to know this and ask themselves 
whether women were in those, times more truly feminine 
than in ours with less romanticism, but with more good 
practical sense. Upon the other hand, we may well ask 
ourselves, whether such a state of things had been pos- 
sible, if women had an opportunity of making them- 
selves useful in some way in the economic affairs of 
society, striving toward economic independence, hav- 
ing an influence in shaping the economic structure 
of society, and taking an interest in the life of 
the nation. Such, however, was impossible under 
the feudal system, as well as under the guild system. 
And I want to say right here, that speaking of economic 
independence of women as a powerful liberating factor, 
I do not mean such independence in isolated cases, but 
as a general condition, although it is not altogether 
without influence, even if appearing sporadically. As 
is was, the women of the lower classes were, in the 
country, slaves of the field, in the cities, slaves of the 
large household, which included beside the family, the 
journeymen and apprentices; the women of the upper 
classes were, at least in earlier times, slaves of the house- 
hold, and both were subject to the superior will of their 
lords and masters. The only semblance of freedom ex- 
isted among the prostitutes. 

Time passed on and the guilds died. In respect to 
death the fate of human institutions does not differ from 
the fate of man himself. Powerful as the guilds were, 
and indispensable as they were considered in their 
days for the existence of human society, society nev- 
ertheless exists to-day without them. The ruling classes 
always believed their institutions to be indispensable for 



76 I.OOKING FORWARD 

the welfare of mankind; they beheve so to-day. Yet 
subsequent history never failed to show the fallacy of 
such belief. Is it to be doubted that future history will 
do the same? 

The guild system was a system of restraints, but 
these restraints, in course of time, became obnoxious to 
the very class that had created them for its own protec- 
tion. For never was human ingenuity able to devise 
social or economic institutions that did not from their 
very beginning conceal within themselves the elements 
of their own destruction. There could be no evolution 
if it were not so. Every economic system will collapse 
or topple over upon reaching the climax of its develop- 
m'ent, but long before reaching that point, the signs of 
its coming death will become visible, not to everybody, 
perhaps, but to the cool and prudent observer. 

The guild-system served its purpose to protect and 
enrich certain classes quite well. But when the power 
of production increased in consequence of the inventive 
genius of man, and when commerce also increased, espe- 
cially after the discovery of the Western continent and 
the finding of the ocean-passage to India towards the end 
of the fifteenth century, and when the accumulated wealth 
was gradually turned into capital, that is, turned from a 
source of enjoyment into an instrument of profit-making, 
which was greatly facilitated by the growth and exten- 
sion of money-economy, the restrictive system failed to 
serve its purpose. It became a hindrance to the use of 
capital and the increased power of production. Capital 
needs elbow-room. It is inimical to every restriction in 
its use. It needs room for the expansion of its uses. 
So it came that the classes against whom restriction was 
directed, were hardly more instrumental in its overthrow 



THE STATUS OF WOMAN 77 

than the class for whom it was instituted, and who had 
grown rich under it. The accumulation of wealth had 
reached a point where restriction became a barrier to 
further increase and accumulation. Having reached the 
climax of its development, where it was no longer able 
to serve its original purposes, where in fact it became 
an obstacle to the objects for which it had been created, 
its death was inadvertible. The era of free trade and 
competition appeared. (The expression free trade is not 
to be understood as meaning absence of tariff-duties, but 
absence of restrictions of trade.) 

It must not be understood that all the restraints were 
removed at once. It was done gradually, one after the 
other, during and after a long continued class-struggle. 
In France the last feudal rights and guild-restraints 
were abolished during the great revolution, and in Ger- 
many after the revolution of 1848. There was plenty of 
feudalism in our country prior to the revolution and the 
declaration. of independence, and even some time after- 
wards. We had not only negro-slavery, but it was also 
possible to keep white persons in bondage as debtors, 
apprentices, or under some sort of contract. In Penn- 
sylvania white persons were sold like slaves, for terms 
at least. Here are two samples of advertisements that 
recently came under my notice: 

"To be sold. A likely Servant Woman having three 
years and a half to serve. She is a good spinner." = — 
(Pennsylvania Gazette, June 1742.) 

"To be sold. A Dutch apprentice lad who has five 
years and three months to serve; he has been brought 
up to the Taylor's business. Can work well." — (Penn- 
sylvania Staatsbote, Dec. 13, 1773.) 

With the growth of industrialism, however, labor 



78 I.OOKING FORWARD 

was freed, for, as I remarked before, experience had 
taught that the free laborer was a better property pro- 
ducing machine than the man held in bondage. 

And now commenced the stupendous growth of cap- 
ital and its career of industrial and commercial expan- 
sion and exploitation of human labor. It was im- 
mensely aided in this career by the discovery of natural 
forces, not known hitherto, such as that of steam and 
electricity, and the invention of machinery, through 
which the power of production increased astoundingly. 
From now on the economic history of the new world 
does not differ materially from that of the old. The 
new era took over from the old the large mass of land- 
less and propertyless people, and material for the ex- 
ploitation of labor existed in abundance. The laborers 
being free, they were also left to compete with each 
other. This resulted in two kinds of competition, that 
between employer and employer, and that between 
laborer and laborer, both kinds of competition tend- 
ing to increase wealth on one side and poverty on 
the other. And although I am ready to admit that 
during this period the condition of the laborers im- 
proved and that they became able to satisfy needs and 
tastes which could not be satisfied by the laborers of 
former periods, yet it remains true that in proportion to 
the increase of the power of production and the stupen- 
dous growth of wealth, they became actually poorer. 

A good deal of the improvement in the condition of 
the working-classes consists in the possibility of procur- 
ing things which, from a modern standpoint, may seem 
quite necessary for the support and enjoyment of life, 
but are not absolutely so. They are things of luxury or 
comfort which one does not miss, if one does not know 



the; status of woman 79 

of them. But as far as food and wearing apparel are 
concerned, the workmen of five centuries ago seem to 
have been as well, if not better, off than those of to-day. 
This is amply proven by the sumptuary laws of those 
times. In Saxony it was ordained in 1482 that mechan- 
ics and mowers must be content with receiving beside 
their wages in money, twice a day, at noon and in the 
evening, four "speisen" (kinds of food) : soup, two 
kinds of meat and one kind of vegetables, and on fast 
days five "speisen": soup, two kinds of fish and two 
kinds of vegetables. 

In England, parliament passed in 1463 a statute by 
which agricultural laborers were not allowed to use 
materials for clothing, which cost more than two shillings 
a yard, nor were they to have a pair of stockings which 
cost more than fourteen pence; silver girdles were also 
prohibited. A wife was ordered not to give more than 
a shining for a head dress. Twenty years later laborers 
were allowed to have stockings which cost eighteen pence 
a pair and a wife might spend one shilling and eight 
pence for a head dress. Considering the value of money 
in those times, these prices were enormously high. 

Undoubtedly, the workingmen enjoy to-day the com- 
fort of things that then did not even exist, and which, 
therefore, even the wealthiest did not have, but the fact 
that, for instance, emperor Nero could not with all his 
power procure a gas-stove or a petroleum-lamp, does not 
make the laborer of the twentieth century a whit hap- 
pier. It must also not be overlooked that dissatisfaction 
in one class of people is not so much produced by the 
latter's own condition, as by comparison between its 
condition and that of another class. The poorest Amer- 
ican workman has in his most humble dwelling far more 



80 LOOKING FORWARD 

comfort than the Eskimo in his snow-hut, but, of the 
two, the Eskimo is, probably, the more happy and con- 
tented. 

The new industrial system, the characteristic of 
which is the massing together of hundreds and thous- 
ands for production under centralized direction in the 
most economical manner, with division of labor and the 
aid of all technical facilities which the ingenuity of man 
could devise, not for the immediate purpose of con- 
sumption, but for the purpose of commerce, had won- 
derful eflfects, and produced an economic class, which 
gradually acquired all the power and influence formerly 
possessed by the landowing class. It changed the char- 
acter of whole nations, made England, which formerly 
had been a purely agricultural country, a purely indus- 
trial country, and is now completing the same process in 
Germany. It is due to the vastness of the country that 
the same effect was only partially produced in the United 
States, but in the New England states agriculture is 
nearly extinguished. It built railroads and steamships, 
reducing distance to almost nothing, thereby facilitating 
the shifting of population for industrial purposes; it has 
tarnished the escutcheons of nobility and robbed titles 
of their awe; it has democratized the world politically, 
without, however, being able to abolish social distinc- 
tions ; it has produced an enormous mass of wealth, such 
as the world has never seen before, and made one class 
produce it for the other without the use of physical force 
or compulsory service, merely by the operation of eco- 
nomic conditions. Originally destined to break down 
monopoly created by the force of law, it soon created 
monopoly by mere economic force. By the same force 
of conditions only, without the use of any legal or phys- 



the: status of woman 81 

ical restraints, it closed to certain classes the. higher 
avenues of life just as effectually, as they were formerly 
closed to them by mediaeval laws and institutions, thus 
achieving by technical freedom and equality a result, in 
many respects similar to the results of feudalism and the 
guild-restraints. But while under these latter systems 
the social and political stacus of everyone was clearly 
defined by tradition, custom and law, and the course of 
life laid out by strict regulations in every walk of life 
with such precision, that everyone could, with a degree 
of certainty, foresee and map out his future, the new 
system brought into all classes of society a high degree 
of uncertainty of the prospects of the future, so that in 
course of time it became impregnated with the charac- 
ter of speculation. One of the most marked effects 
which it had, was that on the life and status of women. 
Through all the centuries of slavery, feudalism and 
(may I use the word?) guildism, the women were no 
economic factor. These systems of production left no 
room for women in the economics of the time. Women 
took no part in the production of the necessaries of life, 
except as help-mates in the most uninfluential and the 
most dependent classes, which were not free agencies, 
but were tools or instruments of labor. Through these 
thousands of years women had few, if any, civil or 
property rights; through these thousands of years their 
condition was more or less one of tutelage. Hypocrit- 
ical sentimentalism and gallantry subjected them fre- 
quently to cruel and brutal laws under the pretense of 
protecting their weakness. The natural influence of sex- 
difference made men display in the presence of women 
a deference and courtesy which disappeared in their ab- 
sence. Upon the other hand, long continued usage had 



82 I.OOKING FORWARD 

made women content with receiving homage and flat- 
tery, and left them without aspirations and pretensions 
in public affairs and the political life of the nations. 
False sentimentalism and sickly romanticism believe even 
to this day that this is the proper position of women, 
that their beauty and graces inspire men to — I would 
say acts of bravery and valor, if mediaeval customs still 
prevailed, but they having become extinct, I must say 
according to the customs of our own times — money- 
making with the hope of carrying away the fairest of the 
fair as wife, whose principal duty shall thereafter be to 
caress away from her husband's brow the wrinkles put 
there by business cares, and make his home comfortable. 
Undoubtedly this is a poetic and idyllic thought. But 
alas, life is no idyl and reality is stronger than fancy. 

And now behold! The competitive system, or as it 
is also called, the capitalistic system, no sooner is firmly 
established, than it draws woman into the whirl of eco- 
nomic life. All the fences and hedges which surrounded 
the individual's life are torn down. All the carefully 
laid pathways for each individual's economic life are 
obliterated, the regulation and protection which the 
social and economic fabric had thrown around the indi- 
vidual and had given his course certainty and steadiness, 
" vanished, and every person was set free and thrown 
upon his or her own resources. But the wealth remained 
in the hands of those who had accumulated it before, and 
now possessed the greatest freedom in its uses. The 
others, men and women alike, were left to their wits and 
possibilities to get along as well as they could. Men 
and women alike had from now on to seek a livelihood, 
unaided by institutions of law, except such for the pro- 
tection of property and contract rights. There still ex- 



THE STATUS OF WOMAN 83 

isted many laws, customs and prejudices which were a 
hindrance not only to women in the use of their eco- 
nomic force, but also to men in the economic use of 
women. What, therefore, was more natural and log- 
ical than the commencement of the movement for the 
emancipation of women? The new economic system 
conjured up that movement. And as natural and log- 
ical as was its creation, so natural and logical was its 
success. It would have been impossible for the indus- 
trial system to make the extensive use of women that It 
was destined to make without giving them full property 
rights. Slowly and grudgingly as they were given they 
had to be given, because the new system of production 
demanded it. It was not a voluntary concession, al- 
though it had the appearance of it. It was not the 
chivalry of the male sex, nor the men's advanced views 
of equality, nor a higher sense of justice that gave to 
women all the rights of person and property. Neither 
was it done from a more exalted conception of right; 
nor was it the continued clamor of women for their 
rights which brought about this change in their posi- 
tion. The new system of production needed women 
who were free in the use of their persons and their prop- 
erty; it could not get along without them. It had been 
discovered that the free male laborer was a better prop- 
erty producing machine than the unfree. Why should 
this not hold true in reference to women? Political 
rights were not necessary for making them good pro- 
ducers; personal and property rights sufficed for that 
purpose; therefore political rights were and still are 
withheld from women, except where they are granted for 
local reasons, as for instance for the purpose of temper- 
ance legislation, or where the lower economic class has 



84 LOOKING FORWARD 

already gained much political power, as in Australia. 
Freedom of contract, however, had become under the 
new economic system an economic necessity, for without 
it, the unhampered exploitation of female labor would 
have been impossible. 

Customs and social habits change slowly. Habit and 
prejudice, therefore, still block the way of women to- 
ward establishing themselves in business of their own, 
but many of them devoted themselves to art and litera- 
ture and teaching. They strove for better education, 
and I say, without fear of contradiction, that the aver- 
age American woman is to-day better educated tfian the 
average American man. But the nineteenth century wit- 
nessed an influx of women in remarkable and still grow- 
ing numbers in industrial and commercial pursuits as 
wage-earners. They entered the office as stenographers, 
typewriters, bookkeepers and clerks, the store as clerks 
and saleswomen, the factory as laborers. The number 
of factory women reaches into the millions. In Eng- 
land women have worked and, I believe, still work even 
in coal mines. In the United States they are generally 
employed in lighter work, such as cotton-spinning, mak- 
ing paper-boxes and principally in the garment indus- 
tries. But they are also found in places where one 
would not expect to find them. So, for instance, I 
found several hundred of them at work in one of the 
largest machine shops in the country, where they were 
spinning thread around copper wire. Wherever the 
hand-work is light, or wherever the machine works auto- 
matically, needing only attendance, we find women of all 
ages in employment. In bakeries and in laundries they 
sometimes perform very hard work. They do even the 
nasty and loathsome work of assorting rags. They 



THE STATUS OF WOMAN 85 

work in the company of men, frequently work ten hours 
a day and more, and do night work as well as day work. 
There are industries, for instance the cotton industry, 
where the number of women far exceeds that of the men. 

As a general rule they receive only small wages, sel- 
dom enough to support them sufficiently and decently. 
They receive from two dollars a week upward to six, 
seven or eight dollars, and only seldom reach ten dollars 
or over. It is needless to say that the moral effect of 
all this is bad, very bad. Not less so is the physical 
eflfect on women. An exhaustive investigation of the 
relation of hard physical work to the health of women 
wage-earners was made by the Massachusetts Bureau of 
Labor statistics. It is shown there that the reproduct- 
ive organs in particular are injured by the strain of their 
labor and that their physical ability to perform the ma- 
ternal functions is greatly impaired. It is even recom- 
mended, as a result of that investigation, that immature 
girls should be prevented by law from working in fac- 
tories, stores, business institutions of all descriptions, and 
that the law should have jurisdiction over the labor of 
all women. 

Of a very serious nature also is the economic effect. 
Woman's labor, being so much cheaper than man's labor, 
replaces the latter in thousands of instances, and fre- 
quently leaves to the men no other choice but to aban- 
don the particular branch of employment or be satisfied 
with smaller wages. In consequence thereof female 
wage-labor has the general tendency to force down the 
wages of men and the standard of living in the laboring 
class. Hence the opposition of labor organizations to 
the employment of women. But the opposition is fruit- 
less. The prevailing economic? system, or rather the sys- 



86 I.OOKING FORWARD 

tern of production, is stronger than this opposition. I 
am of the opinion that, in consonance with the present 
mode of production, the use of female labor will in- 
crease with the growth of industry and the increase of 
the facility of production. There is no other force, at 
present, to counteract its effect on wages than the efforts 
of labor organizations toward increase of wages and the 
elevation of the standard of living of the working class. 
I believe also, however, that in course of time, and as a 
consequence of continued efforts of women to better the 
condition of their sex, the police power of the State will 
be more extensively used toward the improvement of 
the sanitary condition of factories and the prohibition of 
the employment of female labor at periods and in kinds 
of work peculiarly injurious to the sex. I regret to be 
compelled to say that, in this respect, the laws in this 
great republic are far behind those of some of the Euro- 
pean monarchies. 

After woman had been drawn into the whirl of eco- 
nomic life as wage-earner, having been forced to take up 
the struggle of existence for herself, it was natural and 
unavoidable that she would enter the struggle for supe- 
rior position, for that is one of the forms of the economic 
struggle of our time. Her energy and force once em- 
ployed in the economics of the time, there was no reason 
for her, after having discovered their value, to use them 
only in inferior positions. The consciousness of her 
force and ability having been awakened in her, why 
should she not strive for all the accomplishments neces- 
sary for the higher positions and become lawyer, doctor, 
or anything better than a mere wage-earner? Has any- 
body a right to complain? Had not competition been 
proclaimed to be the life of trade? Did the theory hold 



the: status of woman 87 

good only as to industry, commerce and common labor, 
and not as to the professions? Had doctors and law- 
yers a right to complain of competition while working- 
men had not? From the moment that exploitation of 
female labor force was begun, the modern woman- 
movement was destined to appear. It owes its birth to 
our economic system, and no prejudice and no scorn will 
prove strong enough to hinder it in its onward course. 
Henceforward it will be a very important factor in the 
evolution of social institutions. 

The ^'new woman" will not any longer be an object 
of ridicule, but of respect; she will soon not be "new" 
any more; and I am sure the time will come, or rather 
return, when the voice of women will neither re- 
main unheard, nor unheeded in matters of public con- 
cern. 

Bad as the moral, physical and economic effect of 
woman-labor in offices, stores and factories is at pres- 
ent, I believe that it is merely a phenomenon peculiar 
to all transitions. The birth of a new time is always 
attended with pain and suffering. The adjustment of 
social institutions and regulations of life to new eco- 
nomic conditions is necessarily a slow process, and 
changes which are beneficial to mankind are, in the begin- 
ning, very often injurious to single classes. Liberation 
was not an immediate unmixed blessing to the slave 
who needed time to learn the use of freedom. The in- 
troduction of machinery, one of the greatest blessings to 
mankind, caused much misery and suffering by throw- 
ing thousands out of employment. I am sure a time 
will come when all the evils of female labor will have 
disappeared, and when it will be of general benefit to 
individual and social life. It will not always be in the 



88 IvOOklNG VORWARD 

form of cheap employment, it will not always be \n the 
form of wage-labor. I am sure, that in the selection of 
woman's work, full regard will be had to her physical 
and mental characteristics. I think it will gradually, 
though in all probability very slowly, assume a form 
which, together with other causes, will bring about the 
economic freedom of women, and along ]vith this, per- 
fect social and political equality of the ?^xes. 

I have endeavored to show in this chapter that eco- 
nomic institutions are not less subject to change than 
other human institutions; that along with the evolution 
of economic institutions, the status of woman also under- 
went changes, and that it always stood in close relation 
to her participation in the economics of the time. The 
condition of women improved, their power and influence 
increased or decreased in proportion to their being a 
factor in the process of the production of the necessaries 
of life, in being an economic factor in the life of the 
nation. Hence I conclude that the woman question is 
an economic question and that sentiments of right and 
justice play only a secondary role in the solution of the 
problem, such sentiments being themselves the product 
of economic conditions. 

I am frank enough to state that I do not see how 
under the present economic organization of the world 
the economic independence, necessary for the full eman- 
cipation of women, may become possible. For to repeat, 
if I speak of the economic independence of women, I do 
not mean independence in isolated cases, but independ- 
ence as a general condition. I do not mean the possi- 
bility for some women of becoming independently rich 
in some way, or receiving good wages in competition 
with other women or in competition with men. Wag'e- 



THE STATUS OF WOMAN 89 

labor can never create general independence. I demean 
the absolute certainty of, and positive right to, a suffi- 
cient livelihood and reasonable comfort for every mar- 
ried or unmarried woman performing a reasonable 
amount of useful work, be it either physical or intellect- 
ual, adapted to her nature. Great and far reaching 
changes will have to come before this independence 
will be possible, changes in the economic structure of 
society, changes in the form of government. Of what 
nature these changes will be in all their details I am, 
of course, unable to say. I think, however, it is true, 
as is frequently asserted, that society is passing from a 
condition of individualism into a condition of socialism. 
I think it is also true that the creation and the growth 
of trusts prove it and indicate the advent of new eco- 
nomic arrangements based on the principle of associa- 
tion. They certainly are directed against competition 
and, perhaps, evidence the fact that the system of com- 
petition has reached its climax and is slowly dying. Per- 
sonally I am inclined to believe so. But while there can 
be no doubt of its death at some time, because to deny 
that would be a denial of all evolution of progress in the 
past and in the future, and while we may predict with a 
degree of certainty the general principle on which the 
social structure of the future will be erected, we cannot 
possibly at this time describe all its forms in detail. 

Economic independence as I mean it, has, it is need- 
less to assert, not yet been reached even by men. But 
it is a fact, that women generally depend on men for 
their support, and that this dependence is considered to 
be quite within the natural order of things, whereas 
cases in which men depend on women for their support 



90 IvOOKING FORWARD 

are rare, and are considered without the natural order 
of things. This is the cause of many inferiorities In 
woman's Hfe and position in spite of all legal, personal 
and property rights given to her. But of this I shall 
speak in other chapters of this book. 



III. 

The Family. 

Monogamy is in present times generally prevalent in 
the entire civilized world. The monogamian family 
gradually and slowly grew out of the Syndiasmian. It 
is based upon exclusive cohabitation between one man 
and one woman, theoretically for life. According to 
Morgan's hypothesis, it owes its existence to the wish of 
establishing paternity with certainty for purposes of in- 
heritance. As I said before, I do not fully agree with 
this hypothesis, although the motive of establishing fath^ 
ership with certainty may have been very powerful to- 
ward maintaining monogamy after its establishment and 
with the continued growth of property. From my 
studies, I conclude that there must have been a more 
direct economic reason for it, although it cannot be de- 
nied that there was, probably, always a close relationship 
between marriage and inheritance. So, for instance, we 
find in the Pentateuch (Numbers, ch. 36), that the mem- 
bers of the tribe of Joseph objected to the marriage of 
the daughters of Zelaphahad out of the tribe, because, as 
they said: "Then shall the inheritance be taken from 
the inheritance of our fathers, ^nd shall be put to the 
inheritance of the tribe, whereunto they are received"; 
and that by the decision of the Lord, they were not 
allowed to marry out of the tribe. But we find that the 
objection was purely economic, and that there was not 
a bit of sentimentality about it. Those who objected did 

91 



92 I^OOKING FORWARD 

SO in their own interest, not only in that of their pro- 
geny. 

At that time monogamy was not yet known, and land 
was held in common within the tribe. The common 
ownership of land secured to every member of the tribe 
at least a subsistence. With the establishment of pri- 
vate ownership in land, however, and especially after the 
tribal relation had ceased to be a part of the govern- 
ment; and after the state, based upon territory and pri- 
vate property had been established, existence became 
uncertain and sometimes precarious. Every man had to 
look out, and establish an existence, for himself; the 
larger the family, the more difficult it became to support 
it. It seems to me that for the majority of people, a 
system producing only small families became a neces- 
sity after the establishment of private ownership in land. 
We must not forget that until late in the period of civili- 
zation, land was the only ''real'' property, and agricul- 
ture the principal and most general pursuit for produc- 
ing the necessities of life. The establishment of the 
monogamous family came, in all probability, shortly after 
the establishment of private ownership in land. In the 
absence of those ties that made the members of a tribe 
more or less one large family and with the dissolution of 
the nation into a number of self-supporting individuals, 
I cannot imagine a form of family that would better fit 
a system of private ownership of land and its mode 
of using it, than the monogamian. The monogamian 
famfty, under such circumstances, became an economic 
necessity. 

History leaves us in ignorance as to the time of the 
introduction of private ownership in land as well as of 
the monogamous family. The ancient Germans are the 



THE FAMIIyY 93 

only people among whom the monogamian family seems 
to have existed prior to the introduction of private own- 
ership in land. But our knowledge of their family life 
is very limited, and considering that in the Syndiasmian 
family people lived also in single pairs, it is by no means 
certain that at the time of Tacitus the monogamous fam- 
ily was already generally established among them. 

Theology may look at monogamy as a moral precept 
only, but theology and science see with different eyes. 
It is true that the moral sentiment of the modern world 
is strongly against bigamous or polygamous marriages, 
but neither the Old nor the New Testament forbids 
them, and the modern prevailing sentiment upon this 
point must, therefore, have sprung from another source 
than the scriptures. Moral views spring from the fitness 
of things, from usefulness or necessity. Usefulness, 
necessity and fitness, however, are relative terms and 
are subject to change with time and conditions. Neces- 
sarily, therefore, the moral views of mankind change 
correspondingly. 

There never could be and there cannot be a standard 
of moral principles suitable to all times and conditions. 
Moral principles are always conservative, using the 
word in its strictest sense. Their function is to con- 
serve that which is. The most tyrannical powers and 
the most vicious institutions have been justified on moral 
grounds. What sustains an existing order of things Is 
moral, what threatens destruction to it is immoral. The 
ruling classes have always monopolized the dictation of 
moral precepts. Because of the controlling influence of 
economic interests over human institutions, relations 
which do not fit the economic structure of society offend 



94 



LOOKING FORWAED 



the moral sense of the time, although no general con- 
sciousness of that influence exists. 

Existing economic conditions and moral principles 
must, on account of the everlasting evolution of the for- 
mer, become disharmonious from time to time. Then 
follows a slow revolution of moral sentiment, a process 
of adjustment. 

Economic fitness and usefulness have gradually made 
the moral sense of the modern world look at the monog- 
amous family as the only one permissible in conscience. 

Considering, however, the fact that all human insti- 
tutions are subject to evolution, have we a right to 
assume that the family is an exception? I am not in- 
clined to indulge in speculation upon this delicate sub- 
ject, but I can see no reason whatever why I should 
believe that changes in the economic forms of society 
will leave the form of the family forever unaffected. 
One thing, however, I do not fear to say, and that is, 
that I am not inclined to believe that a form of the fam- 
ily alongside of which such a fearful institution as that 
of prostitution is possible, can be the highest form of 
the family which the human race is able to evolve. 

We hear it frequently said that the family is the basis 
of the state. This idea is brought forth, principally, in 
arguments for more stringent divorce laws. However, 
it is not true, neither in theory nor in fact. Both, fam- 
ily and state rest upon entirely different principles; the 
organization of the state rests on territory, that of the 
family on personal relations. While really the relation 
of cause and effect does not exist at all between the two, 
yet if one wishes to establish some such sort of rela- 
tion, then the state is rather the basis of the family. 
The state prescribes the forms under which families may 



THE FAMILY 95 

be legally established, the state determines the legitimacy 
or illegitimacy of offspring, and the state establishes 
laws of inheritance. It has the power to change the 
laws and precepts upon these matters without affecting 
its own existence and general powers. Upon the other 
hand, the family has not the least power over the state. 
In a» certain sense the family is the creature of the state, 
in so far as the latter gives legal force to the prevailing 
moral sentiment, but in no sense whatever is it the basis 
of the state. The theory is probably an inheritance 
from the times when the family was considered an insti- 
tution necessary for the production of soldiers for the 
king, and the raising of many children, especially boys, 
an act of patriotism. It is not the habit of modern 
mothers to display that kind of patriotism. 

I either misunderstand the signs altogether, or else 
the economic conditions of our time have a destructive 
influence on the family. 

I have a friend who lives in one of the large Eastern 
cities. He has an extensive manufacturing business, is 
a very careful business man and in very comfortable 
circumstances. He has three sons and three daughters, 
all unmarried with the exception of one daughter. The 
other two girls have, since some time, been of marriage- 
able age. The oldest son, more than thirty years old, 
travels for his father's business; the second has chosen 
a profession, and holds a position with a salary of tour 
thousand dollars a year. On the occasion of a visit I 
asked him why he did not marry. "My dear uncle," 
(my friend's children call me uncle), he said, "with four 
thousand dollars a year, I am unable to support a fam- 
ily." The answer was a sufficient explanation, not only 
why he, but also why the others, the girls included, 



96 I^OOKING FORWARD 

were not yet married. I know men who would cer- 
tainly not have let the opportunity escape to fire a volley 
of good advice and sentimental teaching upon the young 
man, and to exhaust all their eloquence and wisdom to 
show him the folly of his position. I, however, kept 
silent. Of what use would it have been to speak? He 
belonged to a set among whom four thousand a year 
was not considered sufficient to support a family, accord- 
ing to their standard of living, of course, and as even in 
that set incomes of over four thousand dollars a year 
are not exceedingly numerous, especially in younger 
years, marriages are delayed until late in life, where 
there is no preference for bachelorhood till death. Once 
in a while a man or a woman, carried away by great 
affection, has sufficient strength of character to marry 
out of his or her set or class, but these cases are com- 
paratively rare. 

Such sets are to be found in every community. The 
only difference between the sets and the communities is 
in the limit of income below which marriage is consid- 
ered impossible. A certain bank in Chicago has set for 
its employees the limit at one thousand dollars. I re- 
cently read in the newspapers that that bank advised its 
employees that those with a salary of less than one thou- 
sand dollars would not be allowed to marry without the 
consent of the bank officials and keep their positions. 
It was evidently thought that one thousand dollars was 
the least with which a bank employee can support a fam- 
ily and remain honest. Nothing was said of an increase 
of their salaries to a thousand dollars, where it was less, 
in case they intended to marry. 

In Bebers ''Woman in the Past, Present and Future," 
I find a table of statistics, giving the number of mar- 



THE FAMILY 97 

riages among ten thousand of population in different 
countries and years, the latter running from 1873 to 
1886, both included. The table gives the following fig- 
ures for the countries here named for each year during 
that period: 

Holland 171, 168, 167, 165, 162, 155, 153, 150, 

146, 143, 142, 144, 139, 139. 
Switzerland 152, 166, 179, 162, 157, 147, 138, 137, 

136, 135. 136, 136, 138, 137- 

Austria 188, 181, 171, 165, 150, 152, 155, 152, 

160, 164, 157, 157, 152, 155. 

France 178, 167, 164, 158, 150, 151, 152, 149, 

150, 149, 150, 153, 149, 149. 

Italy 159, 153, 168, 163, 154, 142, 150, 140, 

162, 157, 161, 164, 158, 158. 

Belgium 156, 152, 145, 142, 149, 135, 136, 141, 

142, 140, 136, 136, 136, 134. 

England 176, 170, 167, 166, 157, 152, 144, 149, 

141, 155, 154, 151, 144, 141. 

Scotland 155, 152, 148, 150, 144, 134, 128, 132, 

139, 140, 140, 135, 129, 124. 

Ireland 96, 92, 91, 99, 93, 95, 87, 78, 

85, 86, 85, 91, 86, 84. 

Denmark 162, 164, 170, 171, 161, 148, 147, 152, 

156, 154, 154, 156, 141, 142. 

Norway 145, 153, 157, 154, 151, 146, 135, 133, 

128, 134, 132, 137, 133, 131. 

Sweden 146, 145, 140, 141, 137, 129, 126, 126, 

124, 127, 128, 131, 133, .... 

Hungary 226, 214, 218, 198, 182, 187, 205, 182, 

198, 203, 205, 201, 

In the German empire the number of marriages for 
each one thousand of population was 8.5 in the decade 
from 1 861 -1 870; from 1871 to 1880 it was 8.6, and from 
1881 to 1888 only 7.8. 

There is not one among the countries mentioned 



98 



IvOOKING FORWARD 



where the figures do not show a decided tendency to- 
ward a decrease In the number of marriages. 

American statistics on this subject are very scanty. 
Mr. Carroll D. Wright informed me that the national 
bureau of labor has not published any report upon the 
subject of marriage and divorce since 1889, the report 
published in that year covering twenty years of sta- 
tistics of marriage and divorce in the United States. 
Having to make comparison with population, there were 
only available to me the figures of the two census years, 
1870 and 1880. The report mentions only Connecticut, 
the District of Columbia, Massachusetts, Ohio, Rhode 
Island and Vermont as giving reliable figures in refer- 
ence to marriage, so that I am able to make up only the 
following table of statistics: 

States. 

Connecticut 

Dist. of Columbia, 
Massachusetts . . . 

Ohio 

Rhode Island 

Vermont 



PopU' 


lation. 


Man 


1870 


1880 


1870 


S3M54 


622,700 


4.971 


131,700 


177,624 


1,500 


1457.351 


1,738,085 


14,721 


2,665,260 


3,198,062 


22,459 


217.353 


276,531 


2,362 


330,551 


332,286 


2,928 



1880 

4,745 
1,623 

15,538 

27,805 

2,769 

2,607 



These figures show a slight increase only for Ohio, 
from 8.43 marriages for each one thousand of popula- 
tion to 8.69; Connecticut and Vermont, although show- 
ing an increase of population, had not only a relative, 
but even a positive decrease in marriages, the first from 
4,971 to 4,745, the latter from 2,928 to 2,607. The rel- 
ative decrease in the District of Columbia was from 
11.39 for ^^^^ one thousand of population to 9.14; in 
Massachusetts from 10. li to 8.94, and in Rhode Island 
from 10.87 to 10.05. 



the: family 09 

Meagre as these figures are, they are, however, suf- 
ficient to show that in the United States the same ten- 
dency toward a decrease in the number of marriages 
prevails as in Europe. There is no reason to presume 
that statistics extending over a longer period of time or 
a larger number of states would bring forth a different 
result. At the same time these figures are very instruct- 
ive to those who complain so much about hasty mar- 
riages; for they show that the number of marriages in 
the United States is considerably smaller than in any 
European country, Germany and Ireland excepted, v/here 
the ratio is about the same as in the United States. It 
is to be observed that the foregoing table of statistics 
for European countries gives the number of marriages 
for ten thousand of population, while for Germany and 
the United States the numbers are for each one thou- 
sand. 

There Is everywhere a tendency toward a steady de- 
crease in the number of marriages, and, so far as I am 
able to observe, human nature not having changed, to 
what else can it be ascribed than to our economic condi- 
tions, to the uncertainty and precariousness of existence ? 
The latter assumes different aspects in different classes 
of society, but in principle and effect it is the same in 
almost all of them. And although some people call 
many of the considerations which keep men from mar- 
rying folly, they are, on the contrary, frequently enough 
the result of a high degree of conscientiousness, the feel- 
ing of a duty to accumulate enough in a comparatively 
short time so as to provide for old age and an assured 
income for wife and children in case of death, lest they 
be thrown upon their own resources and compelled to 
give up the mode of life to which they are accustomed. 

LOfC 



100 I^OOKING FORWARD 

The most favorably situated in respect to marriage 
are, as it seems to me, the skilled workingmen. Although 
there are periods of prosperity and of enforced idleness, 
periods of high wages and low wages, yet there is suf- 
ficient regularity in their economic condition to secure 
them an average income with which they can live and 
support a family according to the standard prevailing in 
their class. If they remain in good health and live long 
enough, they may be able to accumulate a small compe- 
tence for their widows. Beyond that their hopes do not 
go. There is no beyond that for them. In case of an 
early death of the husband, the widow will, if she should 
not marry again, support herself by her own work. She 
knows that such misfortune may befall her, but she takes 
the risk, not from choice, but from necessity. In most 
cases she would have to support herself by her own 
work anyway, if she remained unmarried. So,- the risk 
which the women of the working classes take is not very 
great. I doubt not that statistics, if we had any, would 
show that among the working people the number of 
marriages, although varying with temporary conditions, 
does not decrease within long periods. 

The class most unfavorably situated in reference to 
marriage is that of office employes, the class among 
whom the young man with a salary of twelve or fifteen 
dollars a week deems it necessary to wear a dress suit 
at social functions. There are thousands and thousands 
of young clerks whose weekly salary is less than twelve 
dollars; I doubt that the average salary among office 
workers, leaving even women out of consideration, is 
much above fifteen dollars; it may be even below that. 
It is well known that these salaries, during the last 
twenty or more years, have steadily declined. But they 



THK FAMII.Y 101 

are salaries, and it makes all the difference in the world 
whether a man receives a salary or wages. Salary im- 
plies social position and social pretensions, of which the 
man receiving wages knows little or nothing. Social 
pretensions are expensive. An income sufficient to sup- 
port comfortably a workingman's family is frequently 
insufficient to support a single man of the class receiv- 
ing salaries. And so it comes that in certain classes of 
society one will find a large number of pretty, charm- 
ing, well educated women, who would make excellent 
wives and excellent mothers, slowly but surely approach- 
ing the age at which the world cruelly calls them old 
maids, suppressing painfully all natural instincts, desires 
and affections, and at last, in sheer desperation, marry- 
ing either an unloved man, or burying all hopes for, and 
aspirations to, the happiness to which woman is by nature 
destined, and to which, from a standpoint of pure moral 
justice, she is entitled. 

What physiological and psychological effect this has 
on woman, how terribly injurious this condition is to the 
female organism, how dangerous it is to individual and 
social health, the physician, the psychiatrist and the 
sociologist are able to tell. Men have advantages which I 
need not discuss. Reliable statistics show that of all the 
insane and suicides, the overwhelming number are unmar- 
ried. Bavarian statistics of 1858 show among the insane 
eighty-one per cent unmarried, seventeen per cent mar- 
ried, and two per cent unknown. In Saxony there were 
in 1856 among a million of unmarried men one thou- 
sand suicides, among a million of married men only five 
hundred ; among a million of unmarried women two hun- 
dred and sixteen, among a million of married women 
only one hundred and twenty-five. 



102 LOOKING FORWARD 

There are no American statistics in reference to in- 
sanity and suicide which give any valuable information. 
The census of 1880 states the number of male insanes to 
have been in that year 44,391, of female insanes 47,568. 
This, is all I can gather from United States statistics. 

Physicians, lawyers and other professional men 
mostly marry very late in life. The reasons are entirely 
of an economic nature. The peculiar mode of produc- 
tion and distribution of our times, and the economic 
organization resulting therefrom, have produced the 
peculiar phenomenon that all pursuits and vocations 
seem to be overcrowded, and that in everyone of them 
one finds ''too many." This goes so far that every coun- 
try seems to suffer from overpopulation. Nowhere is 
this felt more than in the professions. It seems as if the 
earth was getting too small, especially for the many doc- 
tors, lawyers and others in the learned professions. 
Unless circumstances are exceptionally favorable to 
them, they have to spend the best years of life in their 
efforts to gain a firm foothold and a sure, sufficient in- 
come, sufficient according to the standard of living pre- 
vailing in their class. 

Perhaps, it would be in order now to deliver a ser- 
mon on democratic simplicity, and hurl anathemas on 
vanity, luxury, pleasure-seeking and so forth. But of 
what use would it be? Since when has it been possible 
to avert the logical effects of conditions and institutions, 
combined with those of human nature, by preaching? I 
suppose that many a sermon has been preached against 
luxury, the preacher wearing a diamond pin in his scarf, 
without reflecting for a moment that nobody would wear 
diamonds if there were no people unable to wear them. 
For there is no more real beauty in a genuine diamond 



the: FAMII.Y 103 

than there is in a good imitation. Economic conditions like 
ours which produce classes that are so far distant from 
each other as the millionaire is from the common laborer, 
with all those between them, must of necessity produce 
different standards of living, different degrees of educa- 
tion, different tastes, different manners and different 
rules of politeness. These differences existing, it is 
neither more nor less than human nature that every one 
desires the contact and society of those who are situated 
like him, and inclines toward displaying with some de- 
gree of ostentation his superior social position. The 
most democratically inclined cannot deny the difference 
in the intellectual and moral atmospheres of different 
classes of society. In many cases, therefore, exclusion 
from one's own class for financial reasons may practi- 
cally mean exclusion from all social intercourse, because 
one would not feel happy in the society of another class. 
It is, therefore, false to call it folly to cling to the attrib- 
utes of one's class. We are not the creatures of nature 
merely, but also of social conditions and surroundings, 
and we are what both have made of us. Be that good 
or bad, wise or foolish, it is what it is, and it cannot be 
changed without going back to the original source of all 
of it; that is, the mode of production of the necessaries 
of life, and the consequent mode of their distribution 
resulting in a certain economic organization of society. 
The reader will have noticed that the forces of fam- 
ily deterioration, described so far, have not a directly 
destructive influence, but affect the family indirectly by 
preventing marriage. However, there are circumstances 
arising from our economic conditions which injuriously 
affect the family in the most direct way. Most potently 
is it done by the substitution of woman and child labor 



104 LOOKING FORWARD 

for the labor of men. The astonishing proportion to 
which woman labor has grown is shown by the census 
of 1900. According to this, the number of persons in 
the United States employed in gainful occupations was 
29,285,922, of which 23,956,115 were of the male and 
5,329,807 of the female sex. I purposely avoid to say 
men and women, because the numbers given include per- 
sons of ten years of age and over. It is a sad comment- 
ary on our economic institutions, that it was found nec- 
essary to include persons of so young an age. The ever 
growing desire (call it economic necessity, if you choose, 
it will not alter its pernicious effect) for cheap labor 
tears not only boys and girls from the bosom of the 
family, but also married women and mothers. Visit one 
of the so-called she-towns in New England, where the 
men find no employment and tend to household duties 
while wives and daughters go to work in the cotton mill, 
and you will learn the effect of thus tearing apart the 
members of the family. What can possibly remain of 
the happiness of family life if wives, mothers and chil- 
dren have to eke out their existence in factory labor, 
if they leave the home (and what kind of a home can 
it be?) early in the morning, return late in the even- 
ing, tired and worn out, covered with the dirt and dust 
of the factory, and then, perhaps, start with the prepara- 
tion of the evening meal? 

I have no desire to become sentimental or pathetic, 
but I cannot suppress the thought that our economic 
institutions, in many instances, have the effect of wiping 
out all the moral effects of civilization, turn our hearts 
into stone and make us barbarians. Neither the sav- 
ages of Africa nor those of Australia make their chil- 
dren work for the support of life. To find the institu- 



THE FAMIIvY 105 

tion of child labor one must go to Christian countries, 
where the people boast of their wealth, culture and re- 
finement. 

For^'Studies in Historical and Political Science," pub- 
lished by Johns Hopkins University, William Franklin 
Willoughby, associated, I believe, for a time with the 
United States labor bureau, wrote a series of articles 
under the general title of ''State Activities in Relation 
to Labor in the United States." In one of these articles 
he says that the number of children working in the cot- 
ton mills of Alabama, Georgia and South Carolina is 
estimated to be about twenty thousand. Many of them 
work for ten cents a day, and he knew of babies who 
earned five or six cents. The hours are either from six 
o'clock in the morning until six o'clock in the evening, 
or from six o'clock in the evening until six o'clock in 
the morning. In Alabama he found a child of seven 
years who had worked forty nights in succession, and 
a nine-year-old child, who had done night work for 
eleven months. In South CaroHna he met a five-year- 
old child, working twelve hours every night. He met 
many children doing night work who were unable to 
tell their age, but from their appearance could not be 
older than nine, or, at the utmost, ten years. Many of 
the children are, in consequence of the noise of the 
machinery, half deaf. A physician told him that ten 
per cent of the children employed in the mills die of 
consumption before they reach the age of seventeen. 
The same physician (he lived in a manufacturing town 
in Georgia) told him that during his ten years of prac- 
tice there, he had amputated fingers from more than a 
hundred children, as the result of accidents. He found 
many children without thumbs, some without any fin- 



106 I.OOKING FORWARD 

gers, some even without hands. The mill is generally 
freed from responsibility for accidents by contract with 
the parents or guardians. 

And the nation does not blush for shame, and we 
send missionaries to the heathens to teach them Chris- 
tianity ! 

'The Woman Who Toils'' is the title of a book re- 
cently published by Mrs. Bessie and Miss Mary Van 
Vorst. The authoresses belong to what we, sometimes, 
hear called the aristocratic class. They went into the 
cotton mills of Massachusetts and South Carolina as 
working women and worked and lived with the factory 
women; they then told the world their experience. 
Speaking of Columbia, South Carolina, Miss Van Vorst 
says that the agents of the company go to the mountains 
and hire the girls, holding out great promises to them. 
The girls, poor as they are, come bareheaded and bare- 
footed, but robust and healthy and carrying their whole 
possessions with them in small bundles. (They are 
white girls, just as the children, spoken of above, are 
white.) They are housed in the factory village, which 
is avoided by the inhabitants of the city like pestilence. 
The houses contain from four to six rooms, and are 
filthy and damp. There are three or more beds in each 
room, on the bare walls hang the clothes of the women 
Hving in these rooms. Most of the beds are occupied by 
two persons. Breakfast consists of a small piece of pork 
and one kind of fatted vegetable. The working day 
lasts thirteen hours. Miss Van Vorst was immediately 
employed, and instructed in her work by a sixteen-year- 
old girl. She found that all the girls were chewing 
snuff, from the oldest down to the youngest. The air 
in the mill is almost white from the many particles of 



the: FAMII.Y 107 

cotton flying about. The girls expectorate constantly, 
their lungs become diseased and they frequently carry 
away consumption. Most of them can neither read nor 
write. Only the very youngest of them are lively and 
display signs of health. The others show nothing but 
mute resignation. 

When Miss Van Vorst, after working hours, re- 
turned to her boarding house, supper was ready. It was 
spread on an uncovered board resting on wooden bear- 
ers. The seats, also, were nothing but rough boards. 
There were three large dishes on the *^table." One was 
filled with fish, meat and bones, all mixed up in an ill- 
smelling sauce; the other with salt pork, and the third 
with corn. The conversation turned about a fight which 
had taken place between two jealous women. 

The girl with whom Miss Van Vorst slept said she 
could not go to bed early, because she was too tired to 
sleep. When sick, she would stay at home a day, but 
then came the foreman and bothered her so long that 
she would rather go to work than be further harrassed 
by him. The girl seemed to be entirely worn out. 

In the bed next to hers slept a working woman with 
her child. She was sick, but said that when she first 
came to the factory she was quite well. But those fac- 
tories! She thought the factory had killed her. "Did 
you see the water we have to drink? It is nothing but 
poison ; you can see all kinds of color in. it." The doc- 
tor, she said, would not come to her any more ; he could 
not help her. 

Miss Van Vorst heard a pretty girl ask for work. 
The foreman answered that there was always work for 
such a handsome girl, and then he placed her so that he 
could keep an eye on her. 



108 I.OOKING F0RWAK15 

Some of the older women take thei^ breakfast along 
with them to the factory, and sit down on the dirty floor 
to eat it before work begins. All of them look dirty, 
are unkempt, smell badly and look haggard and wear>. 

The women rise early; at five o'clock the factory 
whistle sounds, they eat their breakfast and at srx 
o'clock they march to the factory. When they come 
home after thirteen hours' work, they are almost too 
tired to eat and throw themselves on their miserable 
beds. 

This sort of life leaves them only one pleasure. It 
is not difficult to imagine of what kind it is, because 
they are, after all, made of flesh and blood. Some enter 
into what they call a factory marriage. It requires no 
kind of legal ceremony. After a time the girl finds her- 
self a mother, forsaken by the man whom she called 
husband. And if the child lives, it will in time also 
work in the cotton mill. The mother? But it is unnec- 
essary to* speak of her. In the city they look down con- 
temptuously upon those women, and accuse them of 
leading immoral lives. 

In Alexander's ''The History of Women" I read the 
following : 'Tt is the characteristic of men in every civ- 
ilized nation to treat the weaker sex with lenity and in- 
dulgence ; to this they are prompted, not only by the 
softer sensations instilled by nature, but also by that addi- 
tional humanity, and those finer feelings which are com- 
monly the result of knowledge, and which raise 
the mind above what is mean, and inspire it only with 
what is generous and noble. Hence, whenever we find 
a people treating their women with propriety, we may 
without any further knowledge of their history, conclude 
that their minds are not uncultivated. When we find 



I 



THIS FAMII.Y 109 

them cultivated, we may conclude that they treat their 
women with propriety/' 

If Mr. Alexander had not written his excellent book 
more than a hundred years ago, I would infer that he 
intended to write a satire on American culture. He cites 
Abraham, who bid Sarah, his wife, to bake bread and 
prepare a meal for his visiting angels, and cites Rebecca, 
who drew water from the well for Isaac's servants, to 
show that in patriarchal times women had to perform 
low services. I am inclined to believe that the working 
women of South Carolina, and undoubtedly of some 
other American states, would not in the least object to a 
return of patriarchal times. 

Certainly, in the families of the well-to-do the lot of 
the women has grown much easier in modern times, 
compared with patriarchal times. But it is the very 
same factory which destroys the lives of poor women, 
that provides the more fortunate housewife with all those 
things that give her ease and comfort, and spare her the 
drudgery of the household, as it was when there were 
no canneries, no cotton mills, no garment factories, no 
laundries and no telephones. 

Although I apprehend that the lot of the women 
working in the Eastern sweatshops is not much superior 
to that of the women working in the Southern cotton 
mills; and although, one may be sure, the lot of the New 
England factory woman is anything but enviable, yet I 
will not say more on this subject, because it is unnec- 
essary for my purposes. 

While the modern household allows women much 
time and freedom for other work besides, while modern 
economics give women employment in many callings, 
and the laws put nothing in her way to hinder her in 



110 IvOOKING FORWARD 

providing for herself, yet custom and prejudice are 
greatly against her. The female lawyer and the female 
doctor are still scarce; churches, as a rule, refuse to 
ordain women for the ministry, and she must be indeed 
a courageous woman, who ventures to do any business 
outside of the office or store. Yet, we are still in the 
period of competition, and to hunt up the buyer, or the 
man to be insured, is one of the most important parts ot 
business. Considering that women are still barred from 
many vocations, considering the small remuneration 
which women receive for their work, is it any wonder 
that many of them see in marriage only a haven of rest 
and marry without choice or love? And who, under the 
circumstances, has the courage to blame a woman for 
marrying for support only? Under the stress of eco- 
nomic conditions a great moral wrong is committed." 
Families are founded, born in deception and destined to 
be destroyed' from within. The want of love on the part 
of the wife is soon felt by the husband, and even if both 
should be strong and honest enough to maintain con- 
nubial fidelity, and successfully resist natural impulses 
and temptations, torture and misery will nevertheless 
be in most cases their inevitable lot. Numerous, how- 
ever, are the instances where the power of resistance is 
small, and what the consequences then are, is told by 
the records of our divorce and criminal courts. Once in 
a while the tragedy ends with suicide, now and then 
even with murder. 

Marriages of convenience, especially where the con- 
venience is on the side of the male parties to them, are, 
fortunately, not as numerous in our country as they are 
in Europe; but there is a decided tendency toward their 



the; famii^y 111 

increase, and we have our share of fortune and title 
hunters. 

In spite of all poetry and romantic literature, con- 
jugal happiness needs for its continued existence not 
only a material economic basis, which will assure the 
absence of financial cares and sorrows, always apt to pro- 
duce estrangement and quarrels, but also from its begin- 
ning freedom of choice on both sides, freedom from any 
kind of economic pressure or influence. Without this, 
the family can never be what it should be, a continued 
source of bliss and happiness. 

The present form of the family sprang into existence, 
and became gradually the generally prevailing form, at 
a time when property commenced its career of master- 
ship over man. Its transformation will certainly take 
place in some future time, which will mark the begin- 
ning of the mastership of man over property. Thfs 
change of mastership will necessarily produce new moral 
conceptions, a new code of ethics. Just as the present 
form of the family corresponds to the moral conscience 
of our time, so will the future form of the family cor- 
respond to the moral conscience of a future period. 
What that form will be, it is impossible to foresee. We 
are unable to' see with the eyes of future generations. 

The monogamian family was born at or about a 
time when land ceased to be the common inheritance of 
gentes or tribes, and, in consequence of the institution 
of private property in land, the ancient communistic 
institutions crumbled away. Gradually and slowly the 
conception of individualism, brought forth by the 
changed economic conditions, crept into the mind of 
man, until it became the ruling moral idea in the eco- 
nomic life of civilized mankind. It became an immense 



112 I^OOKING FORWAllD 

moral force with stupendous practical results. It is 
thought by students of sociolog}^, at least by some, that 
it has nearly spent its career, that its effects are no 
longer beneficial, nay, that it has even become a hin- 
drance to the further development of the human race. 
I believe this to be so, but will not discuss the point in 
this chapter. If it should be so, all our institutions, built 
upon the basis of individualism, will follow a change of 
that basis. Be that as it may, it is, at any rate, notice- 
able that the present form of the family, instituted for 
the purpose of facihtating the creation of families, fails 
to accomplish this purpose any longer. Changes will 
take place, or else the theory of evolution is altogether 
wrong. I care not to enter into speculation as to the 
direction these changes will take, but think it better to 
leave this to the moral conscience and the prudence and 
wisdom of a future generation. 

What I wished to make clear is, that the family is a 
social institution first, and a moral institution after- 
wards; that its form never has been and never will be 
permanent ; that in common with all forms in nature and 
society, it is subject to changes in the course of evolu- 
tion. And I further wished to demonstrate that in the 
evolution of social forms and institutions, the mode of 
production of the necessaries of life, or in a broader 
sense, the economic structure' of society, is of paramount 
influence; that necessity and usefulness create moral 
conceptions, and that the moral sense of man has the 
constant tendency to put itself in harmony with what 
is recognized as being useful and necessary for the wel- 
fare of human society and individual happiness. Social 
institutions no sooner show signs of a retrogression of 
their usefulness and of decay, than a revolution of the 



the; famiivY 113 

moral sentiment in reference to them begins to manifest 
itself, and their moral value is questioned. The power 
of evolution is irresistible, and experience teaches us 
that its course in the production of forms has always 
been from the lower to the higher. Therefore, we may 
confidently expect that, whatever form the family will in 
some future time assume, it will stand on a higher plane 
than the present. It will be in perfect harmony with 
the future economic organization of society, as was the 
group family with the communism of poverty, or the 
patriarchal family with pastoral conditions, or as the 
monogamous family is with modern economic condi- 
tions, and it will be supported by moral views superior 
to ours. 



IV. 

Divorce. 

For the past few years newspapers and clergymen 
were complaining of the steady increase of divorce with 
more or less consternation and dismay. According to 
American fashion, relief was proposed through legisla- 
tion, directed, not against the cause of the evil, but 
against the evil itself. I do not recollect of having read 
in any periodical, or having heard from any preacher, an 
intellectual discussion of the subject, going back to the 
sources from which the evil springs, and being based on 
patient and impartial investigation and study of the prob- 
lem. If a physician, called to a patient, would tell him : 
"It is wrong to be sick. I forbid you to be sick, and if 
you will insist on feeling sick, I will keep you in a con- 
tinuous state of suffering," he would act on the same 
general principles on which the virtuous and enraged 
editors and ministers act who recommend nothing else 
but more strenuous and stringent laws against divorce. 

Once in a while an especially wise individual makes 
the startling discovery that there could be no divorces 
if there were no marriages, and recommends stringent 
and strenuous laws against reckless marriages as a sure 
and never failing remedy. 

A quite humorous contribution, but meant in all seri- 
ousness, toward the efforts to solve the divorce prob- 
lem was sometime ago furnished by the governor of 
Iowa, who caused the introduction of a bill in the legisla- 

114 



divorce; 115 

ture of that state for the establishment of a school of 
matrimony. It was reported in the newspapers that un- 
like legislators of other states, those of Iowa were not 
content to sit down and guess at the trouble. They 
started out to investigate. The result was astonishing 
even to those who believed they had made a study of 
the problem. The difficulty, it was found, did not lie in 
any of the expected directions. It was the result, not of 
waywardness on the part of either husband or wife, or 
yet of an untoward loosening of the ties, but of a gen- 
eral incompatibility on the part of the young couples 
seeking marriage. A girl and a man fall in love at first 
sight, and without considering their adaptability to one 
another, and without understanding the responsibilities 
of marriage, rush away to the altar. 

According to the newspapers it was deduced fronj 
the records of the divorce courts that young men, with- 
out the means of support, have within the past few 
years been hurrying into matrimony, and leading mis- 
erable lives from that time on. The number of young 
men was only exceeded by that of young women who. 
Ignorant of cooking and general housework, became the 
wives of men not financially able to support them at 
ease. 

This is undoubtedly a true and correct statement. 
The amusing part is in the proposed remedy, in the bill 
which authorizes the establishment of a state school of 
matrimony with a state director and five thousand in- 
structors, distributed among the numerous townships. 
According to the provisions of the bill it became neces- 
sary for those wishing to marry to take a prescribed 
course in the college of matrimony and pass a strict 
examination entitling them to a diploma before the nece§- 



116 LOOKING FORWARD 

sary marriage license could be obtained. The course of 
study was left to the director, but it was known from the 
expressed opinion of the governor, that the curriculum 
was to contain a course in cooking. The governor evi- 
dently believed in the saying, *'The way to a man's heart 
is through his stomach." From the foregoing true and 
correct statement it is, however, to be supposed that the 
students were to receive instruction in avoiding or pre- 
venting love at first sight, in the knowledge of true love, 
so as to be able to clearly distinguish it from mere fan- 
cied love, and in sure ways to overcome financial difficul- 
ties. After having achieved an efficiency in these 
branches, the young men and young women were to 
receive a diploma, which evidenced their fitness for mar- 
riage, and then if they did marry, they were destined to 
be happy ever afterwards. 

The bill should have been passed, if for no' other rea- 
son but to introduce a new theme into romances and 
novels. The struggles of lovers with hard-hearted fath- 
ers and mothers who, for this and for that reason, refuse 
their consent, have become somewhat stale in fiction. 
Here would have been, however, a new element of 
obstruction which would have awakened new interest in 
love stories. 

When the human mind stands helpless before a con- 
dition, rather than acknowledge its helplessness, it 
breeds evil and nonsense. Most certainly, there is a 
very effective way to prevent divorces; the law might 
simply refuse them. Granting that the foundation for 
many a divorce is already laid at the time of marriage, 
the number of divorces may certainly be diminished by 
making marriage more difficult and thereby reducing the 
number of marriages. But the question arises whether. 



I 



DIVORCE 117 

as a consequence, the quantity of happiness among the 
people will not decrease, rather than increase; whethei: 
the moral status of society will not rather become lower 
than higher, and whether or not evils will result, com- 
pared with which the evil of numerous divorces will be 
quite insignificant. For, divorce or no divorce, few mar- 
riages, or many marriages, man is made of flesh and 
bone, red, warm blood runs through his veins, and the 
sexual instinct cannot be suppressed by legislation, nor 
can love, respect and happiness be commanded by law. 

When, many years ago, I entered into the practice 
of law, I made it, in a sort of moral enthusiasm, a rule, 
when a party wished to employ me for the purpose of 
getting a divorce, to try to effect a reconciliation. In 
several cases I succeeded, or thought, at least, that I had 
succeeded, when, to my utter dismay, I found afterwards 
that the parties had employed other lawyers and were 
divorced. It set me to thinking, and I came to the con- 
clusion that there is far greater responsibility in playing 
providence than in acceding to the wishes of clients. 
And finally experience taught me that the resolution 
and the process of divorce, in ninety-nine out of a hun- 
dred cases, produce so much heart-rending agony that 
people would not resort to it, if in their misery they 
could find relief somewhere else. 

I am not in possession of any comparative statistics, 
but I am willing to admit that the number of divorces 
in America is considerably larger than in Europe. To 
ascribe it to a lower state of morality, or a want of relig- 
ious sentiment, or a lower degree of consciousness of 
duty, would be a great error. I believe that in intel- 
lectual and moral qualities, Americans compare favor- 
ably with any other nation. I would rather ascribe it 



118 I.OOKING FORWARD 

to the superior democratical sentiment prevailing in the 
American people, so that the influence of caste-preju- 
dice is smaller, that women are less willing to suffer 
brutalities from husbands, and have a higher regard for 
themselves; reasons which I consider anything but 
deplorable. 

Marriage is, by American law, considered a civil con- 
tract and up to the sixth century it was not in the Chris- 
tian world held to be anything else. Prior to that time 
it was not considered that there was any religious ele- 
ment in it, church and clergy had nothing to do with it, 
and the scriptures contain nothing which stamps it with 
a religious character. There was then no necessity for 
the law to declare marriage a civil contract, because it 
had never been thought to be anything else. Beginning, 
however, in the sixth century, the church found it con- 
venient, or necessary for its purposes, to force into mar- 
riage the element of religion, and in the seventh century 
it was by the council of Trent declared a sacrament. 
Prior to the sixth century the clergy had nothing what- 
ever to do with tying the marriage knot. More than a 
thousand years afterward,^ government again commenced 
to consider marriage a civil contract only, and to dis- 
regard the religious element, artificially infused into it 
by the church. Many if not most of the European gov- 
ernments are in advance of us in this respect and recog- 
nize only solemnization of marriage before a civil officer, 
without taking any knowledge whatsoever of religious 
ceremonies or solemnization by a minister, leaving that 
altogether to the sentiment or conscience of the parties. 

It is a general maxim of law that a contract, volun- 
tarily entered into, may also be voluntarily dissolved by 
the parties to it. It may, however, be admitted at once, 



DIVORCE 119 

that so far as the dissolution of the marriage contract is 
concerned, the economic conditions of to-day^ the guard- 
ing of property interests, and the protection of the wife 
and the children, make the interference of the law in 
many cases a necessity. But farther than considering 
the material interests of the parties neither courts nor 
lawmakers should go. Moral or religious scruples 
against divorce generally should not weigh upon them. 
These are matters of conscience entirely foreign to the 
nature of a valid civil contract, and entirely within the 
province of individual judgment. Those who conscien- 
tiously believe that there is a rehgious element in mar- 
riage and divorce and those who consider marriage a 
civil contract pure and simple shall be equally free to 
act according to their belief and conscience. In an age 
of religious freedom government and law should have 
absolutely nothing to do with that side of the question, 
and should not consider the voice of the minister of a 
particle of more importance than that of any other 
citizen. It certainly is the privilege of the minister to 
judge the matter from his particular religious stand- 
point, but it is not the privilege of the State to adopt 
the minister's judgment simply because it is a minister's 
judgment. I am sorry to be compelled to state that I 
am unable to find in all the history of the world a single 
instance where the State put itself under the influ- 
ence of Church and clergy, and where freedom and hap- 
piness did not suflfer in consequence thereof; whereas 
the instances where Church and clergy have sacrificed 
freedom and happiness of the people to their doctrines 
are only too numerous. 

Moral sentiment and law allow only monogamous 
marriages. So far, so good. As there can be no abso- 



120 LOOKING FORWARD 

lute freedom of contract, it is right and proper to guard 
the interests of society by proper legislation in not allow- 
ing persons not considered of discretion, such as minors, 
insane persons, and idiots and also persons within cer- 
tain degrees of blood relationship to enter into the con- 
tract of marriage. But, provided persons are within the 
law, what possible interest can the state or society have 
in the conclusion or dissolution of the contract of mar- 
riage? Of what difference can it be to the state or soci- 
ety whether A is married to B, or to C, or to D, and 
of what benefit or injury can it be to the State or soci- 
ety whether A and B remain in a state of marriage or 
not? Of course, it is of interest to the community that 
the divorced wife and her children be properly sup- 
ported by the husband and father and do not become a 
burden on the community. But if the husband and 
father has property, the court can enforce such support, 
if he has no property but has a conscience, he will sup- 
port them of his own free will, as well as he can, and 
if he has neither property nor conscience, the law is 
powerless with or without divorce. Any punishment 
meted out to a conscienceless husband and father will not 
buy a morsel of bread for the abandoned family. V/hat 
rational ground then exists for the state to interfere, 
except so far as it is necessary for it to become the arbi- 
ter between the parties in reference to matters of prop- 
erty and the custody of their children, if they are unable 
to agree upon these points? 

Certainly, as no contract can be dissolved without 
the consent of all the parties to it, so it is right and 
proper that the marriage contract cannot be dissolved 
by either one of the parties without the consent of the 
other, and that only the law can do it upon proof of a 



DIVORCE 121 

breach of its conditions. But by what shall the law be 
guided? Shall it be guided by the doctrines of a relig- 
ious body? Or by a standard of morals set up by one 
or more churches and generally based on religious doc- 
trines? Or shall the law-maker advance his own perso- 
nal religious doctrines or moral views? I am of the 
opinion that if the state has no material interest in the 
matter, only humane considerations and the interests 
and welfare of the parties concerned, should prevail. 

Granted that the marriage-bond is sacred, whether 
considered so in a religious, poetical or sentimental 
sense, it seems to me that with the loss of mutual love, 
affection and respect, all sanctity of the marriage-tie is 
gone. W;ith love and esteem the marriage state is para- 
dise and bliss, without them it is torture and barren of 
anything that is good. Love and esteem, however, can- 
not be made to appear and disappear at will. What is 
more humane, to compel husband and wife who have 
ceased to love and respect each other, to continue in a 
state of marriage, in which case the want of love must 
necessarily grow into hatred, or to allow them to sepa- 
rate? What kind of moraHty must necessarily result 
from a union which is no longer based on those 
affections the existence of which alone justifies mar- 
riage and lifts the attraction between human beings 
of different sex so far above animal instinct? Those, 
who in consequence of their social position, are accus- 
tomed to the rules of conduct of polite society take care 
not to show the world their actual state of feeling, and 
use their trained power of self-control to suppress pas- 
sionate outbreaks of anger, at least in the presence of 
others, especially their children. But their whole life 
is one of hypocrisy and sham, no amount of care can 



122 I.OOKING FORWARD 

prevent the children from feeHng instinctively the ab- 
sence of affection between their parents, and there is in 
such a family a general void of sunshine and happiness. 
But among those who do not move in social circles 
where one learns self-control in one's conduct, such a 
condition is very likely to lead to acts of brutality. But 
in either case it is the wife who suffers most. Being 
the weaker of the two, and being, from the nature of 
her sex, less in a condition to seek outside of the family 
compensation for what the family refuses her, her life 
is one of misery. In a family like that, the home is 
permeated by an atmosphere of impurity, and nothing 
can contribute more to the happiness of all the mem- 
bers of the family than a clean and honest separation, 
making possible for the husband as well as for the wife 
a clean and honest life. Can the moral status of society 
lose thereby? Is it not enough that social prejudices and 
financial considerations prevent frequently a separation, 
why should the law, and why should doctrinaires com- 
pel people to continue in a life of sham and hypocrisy, 
ending frequently in public scandal? 

Apropos of public scandal : Publicity in the adminis- 
tration of justice is such a great and important princi- 
ple that it is quite difficult to draw' the line where excep- 
tions should be allowed. But is it necessary and can it 
be good for the moral status of society that in actions 
for divorce the domestic affairs of a family, every infi- 
delity, every brutality, every transgression, every error 
and every indiscretion, every trouble and every suffering 
be laid bare before the world? Is it necessary to make 
the persons concerned objects of shame, ridicule and 
scandal? Could not, at least, the newspapers adopt dif- 
ferent ethics and restrain themselves in the publication 



divorce: 123 

of complaints for divorce and the evidence given in di- 
vorce trials? If the law should be powerless in this in- 
stance, should it not be possible for a sense of decency, 
delicacy and kind consideration to manifest itself among 
journalists and readers alike? 

I confess I am unable to see what society profits or 
what public morals gain by not permitting parties who 
are unhappily married and wish to dissolve their union, 
to do it quietly and decently by a method as simple as 
that of marriage instead of compelling them to ventilate 
their troubles before the eyes of the public and make 
their marital relations and domestic affairs a subject of 
common gossip to the disgust of every decent person 
and the pleasure only of the scandal-monger. If they 
were able to agree between themselves in all matters 
concerning them, where is the advantage to society and 
morality of disregarding the delicacy of feeling of the 
parties, of outraging their sensibilities and of forcing 
them to either confess or be convicted of some act of 
brutality, meanness or impropriety before allowing them 
to do what they consider necessary for their happiness 
and from which nobody else suffers, or which is nobody 
else's concern? Whatever one may think of Hester 
Prynne, standing on the pillory with her babe in her 
arms, she certainly is an object of pity; but the sancti- 
monious officials who put her there, and the gossips star- 
ing at her and wagging their tongues^ are absolutely 
repulsive. 

What moral right has society to intrude as judge 
between husband and wife where they do not need a 
judge? Why should society in the form of law and 
justice meddle with the private affairs of parties who 
do not seek an arbiter between them? Is there anyone 



124 I.OOKING FORWARD 

good and holy enough to force upon another his own 
views of goodness? 

It is sad enough that frequently parties cannot, for 
economic or other reasons, agree upon a settlement of 
their affairs and must call for it upon the Court. But 
where such is not the case, I ask in the name of moral- 
ity, in the name of propriety, in the name of practical 
utility, in the name of anything that is just, good and 
noble, with what justification the private affairs of par- 
ties are made a public concern, and why we should, in 
this advanced and enlightened age of democratical senti- 
ment and civil and religious liberty, put people who wish 
to dissolve an unhappy marriage-bond upon the pillory 
of a public trial? 

We hear so many declamations against rash and 
hasty marriages. But they seem to me to be coming 
from persons who have forgotten that there was a time 
when they were young themselves and that it is the 
privilege of youth to love ardently, passionately and un- 
reasonably. It will be difficult to find young lovers in 
whose mind a doubt of the everlastingness of their love 
could be raised. They think they know each other thor- 
oughly, but are, of course, mistaken; for perfect knowl- 
edge of each other is impossible without the close per- 
sonal union of marriage and the community of duties 
and interests of the family. Love would not be love were 
it always reflecting, investigating, hesitating, examining. 
Besides, certain characteristics in man or woman may be 
awakened into life only under certain circumstances such 
as sickness, misfortune or business reverses, and a 
woman's character may be entirely changed by mother- 
hood, so that the discovery of not being well mated, 
always comes, and generally cannot but come, too late. 



divorce; 125 

The charge of hasty and rash marriage is, in this respect 
at least, unreasonable and unjust, if not silly. 

More justice and reason seems to be in the charge 
that young people rush into marriage without seriously 
considering the ability of supporting a family. But are 
they really so much to be blamed even for this? Is it 
altogether their fault? Is not day after day, in speech 
and print, the lie pounded into the young man that by 
industry and economy every man may if not exactly 
become rich, at least get along comfortably? Will you 
blame the young man if he beheves it, if he, knowing 
himself to be industrious and economical, trusts to those 
who preach daily of the excellence of our economic in- 
stitutions, of the possibilities which they offer, of the 
many opportunities only waiting for somebody to make 
use of them, and, confident of his own good intentions 
and his ability, charges himself with the burden of pro- 
viding for the woman he loves and with the responsi- 
bilities of fatherhood? Really, who stands higher 
morally, the young man who thus courageously enters 
into the struggle or the one who does not consider an 
income of three, four, or five thousand dollars sufficient 
for the support of a family, and therefore remains 
unmarried, thereby condemning some young woman to 
maidenhood for life? 

It seems to me that nobody has a right to complain 
of rash and ill-advised marriage, but everybody should 
treat with commiseration those who have chosen unfor- 
^tunately. One should never judge another solely from 
one's own standpoint, but should try to imagine one's 
self in the place of the other. An old German proverb 
says : To understand everything means to forgive every- 
thing. 



126 IvOOKING FORWARD 

* Undoubtedly cases are not rare, in which young 
women marry without much love, and principally for 
the reason that they have become weary of the struggle 
for a livelihood. There is ample temptation for her to 
do worse, but she marries. Somietimes persons of 
good sense and quiet and even temper get along quite 
well even under such circumstances. The woman has 
certainly never told her husband that she did not love 
him; in all probability she professed to love him. Then 
if the m.arriage should turn out unfortunate, the moral- 
ist will say, she deceived him and does not deserve any 
better. Yet, I candidly say that, in view of the bitter- 
ness of a lone woman's struggle for life, I could not cast 
the first stone on her and compel her to drag her chains 
all through her life, not to speak of the other party to 
the contract. 

It is one of the every day assertions of doctrinaires 
that the knowledge of the facility with which divorces 
can be had, is the cause of many a reckless rush into 
marriage, and that if divorce were attended with greater 
difficulty, people would be more careful in marrying. 
This IS an astonishingly absurd reasoning, based neither 
upon logic nor experience. If ever there is a time in 
life when the thought of divorce is farthest from man, 
it is at the time of marriage. It would be a difficult task, 
indeed, to find a single individual who was prevented 
from marrying by the fear only that he, or she, might 
afterwards meet serious obstacles in procuring, or even 
find it impossible to procure, a divorce. Likev/ise will it 
be anything but an easy matter to find a married person 
who treated his marriage affairs lightly because of the 
thought that divorce offers a remedy against the ills of 
marriage. As a general rule w^hen people marry they 



DIVORCE 127 

have the honest intention to marry for Hfe and their 
feehng is not such that room is left for the thought of 
separation. 

Be the ordinary logic that facility of the dissolution 
of marriage will result in an increase of dissolutions, 
and preventive measures in a decrease, good or bad, it 
is at most mere conjecture, not proved by any facts, 
while the contrary conclusion is just as logical, but sus- 
tained by actual conditions besides. If it is pointed out 
that in certain states of the Union where the law facili- 
tates divorces, they are also quite numerous, it must be 
seen that this fact proves nothing, because there is a 
rush to such states from parties desiring divorce and 
residing in states where they find it diflficult to obtain it. 
However, it stands to reason, and a study of ordinary 
life proves it, that where a union difficult or impossible 
of dissolution, is formed, it will result in perfect relax- 
ation of all efforts to maintain it. There is an immense 
difference between the conduct of lovers and the con- 
duct of spouses. The one is characterized by the strife 
for possession, the other by security of possession; the 
one by activeness, the other by passiveness, expressing 
themselves respectively, in tireless attention and careless 
nonchalance. Upon the other hand, there is a natural 
probability that if the marriage-tie could be easily dis- 
solved, there would be an unceasing endeavor to keep 
alive the holy flame of love once existing, and the bliss- 
ful state of wooing would never come to an end. I am 
firmly of the opinion that the best means to accompHsh 
a reduction in the number of divorces, is to make divorce 
very easy. If history teaches anything, it is that free- 
dom is far more productive of happiness and good morals 
than restraint and coercion, and that the straight- jacket 



128 I^OOKING FORWARD 

IS the worst adapted instrument for the creation of sound 
ethics. 

It is well known that the French law did not allow 
divorce until a short time ago and Montaigne, the great 
Frenchman, says : *'We have thought to make our mar- 
riage-tie stronger by taking away all means of dissolv- 
ing it, but the more we, have tightened the constraint, so 
much the more have we relaxed and detracted from the 
bond of will and affection/' 

V. C. Scott says in his book, "The Silken East," the 
following : 

"Burma, as in many other things, is in advance of 
more reputedly civilized countries in the status it 
accords to its women. The infant marriage and shut- 
ting up in walled houses, the polygamy, the harems, the 
social punishment of widows, the denial of spiritual 
rights which prevail in India are unknown in Burma. 
Here women marry when they are of age and after they 
have seen somewhat of the world. They marry, for the 
most part, whomsoever they will and from love. They 
are not handed over as chattels to a man whom they 
know not, but are courted and won. The married 
women's property act has in effect been established for 
centuries in Burma. In this country, where the women 
earn so much, the woman's earnings are her own. 
Divorce is easily obtained, but seldom asked for. The 
lightness of the marriage laws, the readiness of the Bur- 
mese women to enter into an easy alliance, shock the 
virtue of the strenuous foreigner, but within her ideals 
she is a perfectly proper, modest and well mannered 
woman. 

"She has failings. Who has not? Her practice of 
chewing betel is inelegant and destructive to her teeth; 



divorce: 129 

her voice is apt under the pressure of adversity to be 
shrill; her keen business faculties detract a trifle from 
the romance in which, as in a halo, all women are envel- 
oped ; in old age she is very ugly, and even in youth her 
nose is stumpy, her lips a little thick, her cheek bones 
high and heavy — but these are Caucasian objections. 

"In the eyes of the young men of the land the Bur- 
mese girl is a peerless creature, and her influence over 
their hearts and their passions is immense. What is 
more, few men in Burma ever undertake anything of 
magnitude without first seeking the able counsel of their 
wives." 

H. Fielding who has lived in Burma for a number of 
years, tells us that if a Burmese girl marries, she keeps 
her name, nothing indicating that she is married. She 
retains her own property, the husband acquiring no right 
to it, nor to what she herself earns or inherits. What 
they earn together is their common property. He 
further tells us that in Burma marriage can be quite 
easily dissolved. The pair appears before the village- 
elder and asks to be divorced. A record is made of it, 
and then both are free. Each of them keeps his sepa- 
rate property, and the property earned by common effort 
is divided between them. Yet, in spite of the simplicity 
and facility of divorce, divorces are extremely rare and 
in the villages and among the better classes unusual 
and exceptional. The reason for the small number of 
divorces is, according to Mr. Fielding, the ease with 
which divorce can be obtained, having the effect that 
husband and wife treat each other at all times with great 
courtesy and much consideration. 

The only class, in which divorces are frequent, are 
according to the same author, the not quite unobjec- 



130 IvOOKING FORWARD 

tionable followers and hangers-on to the British admin- 
istration, such as clerks, policemen, etc. ''It is horri- 
fying," adds Mr. Fielding, ''to see what a demoralizing 
effect we have on all people coming in touch with us." 

This remark is quite significant. We are in the habit 
of considering savages, barbarians, or peoples in a some- 
what lower stage of culture than our own, with con- 
tempt, and rejoice over the fact that the place of our 
birth was somewhere on the Mississippi, the Rhine, or 
the Thames and not on the Niger or Senegal. Yet, it 
sometimes seems to me that, in many things, half civil- 
ized people, barbarians and even savages are superior to 
us in morals, that the everlasting, all-absorbing hunt for 
wealth kills fine sentiment; that business, as carried on 
in the modern world, spoils character; and that modern 
economics have a demoralizing effect on the conscience. 
Should it be possible that what is good for the Burmese 
might not be good for the European or the American, 
and that freedom becomes dangerous to morality in pro- 
portion to the growth of civilization? Should it be pos- 
sible that the ethics of personal relations must suffer 
with the increase of wealth, the growth of the power of 
production and the extension of commerce, and that 
freedom in personal relations is incorapatible with the 
economic structure of modern society ? It seems so, per- 
haps it is so. War is destructive of morals, and our 
economic condition is that of bellum omnium contra 
omnes, (war of all against all). Business is business, 
that is the excuse which one hears every day for doing 
of what one feels ashamed, just as war is war is the 
excuse for barbarities and cuelties against which the 
feeling of humanity revolts. 

The problem of divorce is an economic problem, as 



divorce; 131 

all our social problems are. A final solution of it is im- 
possible under the prevailing economic system. It is 
only possible under an economic system which would 
make wife and children economically independent of 
husband and father. But as such a system would cer- 
tainly produce a new form of the family, the divorce 
problem would then, perhaps, no longer be a problem. 
The rights and customs of divorce have been diflferent 
under different forms of the family, and as the latter 
corresponded with different economic systems, so did, of 
course, also the former. In the Syndiasmian family 
divorce lay in the pleasure of either party, under the 
patriarchal form of the family, as evidenced by the an- 
cient Hebrew law, divorce lay in the pleasure of the 
husband, and it was a long time after the advent of the 
monogamous family, until the rights of the wife in ref- 
erence to divorce became equal to those of the husband, 
and until the wife had as much right to demand chastity 
of the husband, as the husband had to demand it of the 
wife. It being impossible to foretell the future form of 
the family, it is equally impossible to foretell the man- 
ner of the solution of the divorce problem. I am con- 
vinced, however, that it will not consist in greater and 
severer legal restraint, because such has never proven to 
be an effective means of reform and betterment of con- 
ditions, much less of the improvement of morals. When- 
ever moral doctrines, as expressed by law, custom or 
prejudice, come into conflict with the material or intel- 
lectual needs of man and his desire for happiness moral- 
ity will suffer as long as the conflict lasts. 

Considering that the future form of the family will 
necessarily be the result of a slow and gradual process 
of evolution, it is not impossible that more liberal prac- 



132 I.OOKING FORWARD 

tices in respect to divorce will mark one of the early 
stages of this process. And surely, in proportion to the 
growth of the possibilities of self-support for women, 
and their sense of independence, there will be a change 
in the views in reference to divorce from the orthodox 
to the liberal. 

I am willing to admit without any further investiga- 
tion that the number of divorces in proportion to the 
number of marriages is increasing. But this increase is 
neither cause for astonishment nor for dismay. Indeed, 
I think it would be quite remarkable if it were otherwise, 
and while the fact in itself may be regrettable, it is per- 
haps, after all, a sign of progress. It is the unavoid- 
able consequence of an economic condition which draws 
women in constantly increasing numbers into the eco- 
nomic life of the nation, daily opens for them more fields 
for economic activity, and produces in women a steadily 
growing feeling of independence and ability to provide 
for themselves. As a result thereof considerably fewer 
of them are willing to bear the burden and torture of 
unhappy marriage, and the number of women who feel 
themselves strong enough to insist upon their natural 
right of happiness is daily growing. Under former 
modes of production and economic conditions, the only 
career which was open for a woman who had not shelter 
and support in the home of the parent or husband, was 
that of a domestic servant, or servant to the person of 
the employer. Such services are to most American 
women so distasteful that they understand without 
explanation why, when no other alternative existed, 
unhappily married women, no matter how great their 
misery was, bore their misfortune patiently and submis- 
sively. But conditions are different now. Our social 



divorce; 133 

and economic arrangements compel millions of womien 
to seek a livelihood for themselves, no matter with what 
difficulties they meet. Success is the hope of most of 
them, and it is absolutely useless to fight against the 
logical consequences of the self-reliance resulting there- 
from. Any artificial restraints directed against the 
natural consequences of existing conditions, must neces- 
sarily result in evil. 

The evolution of economics will produce new forms 
of social institutions, and moral views compatible with 
the new forms. B'ut even while the old views prevail 
we need not be governed by doctrines, which, as we can 
clearly see, are no longer in harmony with existing con- 
ditions, nor is it prudent to force a religious element in- 
to mere social or personal relations. Divorce, although 
always an individual problem, would not be a social 
problem at all, if it were not made one by superstition, 
bigotry and intolerance. There is a remarkable incon- 
sistency between the treatment of marriage and that of 
divorce by society. The first, although being the far 
more important, is treated with much less care and con- 
sideration. That society has an interest in marriage need 
not be questioned. For from marriage springs the 
future human being, and although our knowledge of 
the laws of heredity is very lim.ited, yet we know that it 
is an active and influential force in the modeling of 
man. Divorce, however, possesses no creative force. If 
society has any interest at all in it, it is infinitely small, 
and I believe that the increase in the numbef of divorces 
is, to a certain extent, and irrespective of the causes for 
which it is sought, a sign of a gradual emancipation of 
the thought, that others always know better what is 
good for a person than that person himself. 



134 I.OOKING FORWARD 

The time will surely come when, for hygienic as 
well as for moral reasons, two persons, irrespective of 
sex will not sleep in one room, much less in one bed; 
when the same degree of modesty will prevail betv^een 
husband and wife as between strangers of opposite sex, 
so that charms and beauty will not lose their effect by 
force of habit. The time will surely come, when hus- 
band and wife will be as desirous of pleasing and 
appearing beautiful to each other, as if they were still 
trying to win each other; when the wife will dress well 
even for her husband alone, and when no husband will 
return from his work to his home begrimed with the 
dust and dirt of the workshop, thereby offending the 
aesthetic sense of his wife. The time will come when 
married life will be a life of continuous courtship, with- 
out which it is absolutely senseless to expect the strength 
of love between husband and wife to remain unimpaired 
during their whole life. The time will come when the 
family home will be a sanctuary of cleanliness of soul, 
mind and body, and contentment and happiness not be 
undermined by care and crime-breeding uncertainty of 
existence or lust of gold. Then there will be fewer 
divorces. 

It is needless to say that such a condition is impos- 
sible while the present economic system prevails. A 
system which throws every one upon his own indi- 
vidual resources, making as a rule the possession 
of some wealth the condition sine qua non for 
the acquisition of more wealth, creating at the same time 
extreme poverty alongside of extreme wealth, and mak- 
ing the poverty of one class the source of wealth of the 
other, compelling the one to produce the other's wealth, 
is absolutely incapable of producing general happiness 



DIVORCE 135 

and an ideal state of morality. It is really a question 
what is more demoralizing, great wealth or great pov- 
erty. Perhaps great wealth creates more frivolity, and 
great poverty more vulgarity, but both are equally des- 
tructive of good morals and the happiness of family life, 
and equally productive of causes for divorce. But far 
more demoralizing and destructive of real happiness 
than either wealth or poverty, is the system which makes 
the manipulator of wealth rich and the creator of it poor, 
the system which makes gain and accumulation of 
wealth almost the sole object of life. We may be sure 
that wherever we find symptoms of evil in modern soci- 
ety, the original cause of it is most always to be found 
in this system. 



Prostitution. 

'The Social Evil" is the title of a book published 
under the direction of 'The Committee of Fifteen," 
appointed in the fall of 1900 by the chamber of com- 
merce of the city of New York. It commences with the 
following lines : "^Trostitution is a phenomenon coex- 
tensive with civilized society. Barbarous and semi-bar-, 
barous peoples have at times been free from it. The an- 
cient Germans, we are told, tolerated no prostitution in 
their midst; and there are said to be Siberian and Afri- 
can tribes to-day of which the same thing is true. But 
no sooner has a people attained a moderate degree of 
civilization than this social curse has fallen upon it; nor 
has any race reached a point of moral elevation where 
this form of vice has disappeared. . . ." ''Like the pauper, 
the prostitute is a creature of civilization, and like the 
pauper, will continue to thrust her undesirable presence 
upon society." 

While this is true in the main, yet it must be accepted 
with some modification. For it is not civilization per se 
that is the mother of prostitution, but the economic con- 
ditions as they have developed in connection with civili- 
zation. It would be sad indeed, if we were forced to 
conclude that civilization will never be able to cast from 
it that terrible companion. Fortunately, civilization is 
not dependent on the continued existence of the prevail- 
ing economic system, and we may reasonably entertain 



PROSTITUTION 137 

the hope that some future time will witness the death of 
prostitution. 

It is certain that religious prostitution, that is prosti- 
tution as a religious rite, as it was practiced by the Assy- 
rians, Babylonians and other Semitic nations, even 
among the ancient Hebrews, is not known to have pre- 
vailed in an earlier period than that of the upper status 
of barbarism, or in the beginning of civilization. Yet, 
when and how it originated, we do not know. From an 
economic standpoint, however, there is nothing in it 
akin to modern prostitution. 

We are informed by ancient writers that in primi- 
tive Rome and Egypt girls sold their favors prior to 
marriage in order to procure a dowry, and that this 
practice was not considered dishonorable. (In Japan a 
similar custom is still prevalent.) In this case the pur- 
pose is proof that it took place in an advanced state of 
cultural progress, for in earlier stages women were not 
required to have a dowry, the husband rather paying for 
his wife. It was quite late in the progress of civiliza- 
tion, wihen prostitution became a vocation and its fol- 
lowers social outcasts. 

Even if we did not know quite well that the sense 
of modesty and the obligation of chastity as a moral 
conception are the product of the evolution of the 
human race, and almost unknown in the lowest stages 
of savagery, we could not for a moment seek the rea- 
son for the absence of prostitution among savages and 
barbarians in their higher state of morality. Although 
we are apt to misconstrue many of their customs, it 
would be absurd to ascribe to them a moral sense so 
much higher developed than that of civilization, that it 
would exclude the possibility of prostitution. 



138 LOOKING FORWARD 

There can be no question about the moral sentiment 
in reference to prostitution. Through all the centuries 
of its existence moral sentiment has become more and 
more inimical to it without being able to expurgate it. 
Consequently there must be a force in human society 
stronger than the moral force. Undoubtedly there are 
cases of perversity and uncontrolableness of natural im- 
pulses, but such cases are not numerous enough to 
account for the fearful extent of prostitution. Such 
cases excepted, I doubt whether a single prostitute can 
be found, who would not a thousand times prefer a life 
of decency and respectability to a life of shame, if she 
were not prevented by the adversity of economic con- 
ditions. 

It is in the difference of the economic conditions 
where we have to search for the reason of the absence 
of prostitution among savages and barbarians and its 
presence in civilization. There was no place for it in a 
society which had no economic classes; it cannot exist 
where there are no rich' and no poor. The tribal rela- 
tions and the gentile organization with its communistic 
arrangements offered no soil for the growth of that 
detestable institution. Nor would the form of the fam- 
ily existing then permit of its appearance. The soil was 
prepared for it with the introduction of private owner- 
ship in land with all its economic and social conse- 
quences. 

Mr. Alvin S. Johnson, assistant professor of eco- 
nomics at Columbia University the author of the afore- 
mentioned book, who has carefully investigated the sub- 
ject says : 'Tn the first place there is a large class of 
women who may be said to have been trained for prosti- 
tution from earliest childhood. Foundlings and orphans 



PROSTITUTION 139 

and the offspring of the miserably poor, they grow up 
in wretched tenements, contaminated by constant famil- 
iarity with vice in its lowest forms. Without training, 
moral or mental, they remain ignorant and disagreeable, 
slovenly and uncouth, good for nothing in the social 
organism. When half matured, they fall the willing 
victims of their male associates, and inevitably drift into 
prostitution.'' 

'^Another form is closely connected with the appear- 
ance of women in industry. In many cities there are 
great classes of women without any resources excepting 
their earnings as needle-women, day workers, domestics 
or factory hands. These earnings are often so small as 
barely to suffice for the urgent needs of the day. A sea- 
son of non-employment presents them with the altern- 
ative of starvation or prostitution. These form the 'oc- 
casional prostitutes,' who, according to Blaschko (an 
eminent German physician and writer on this subject) 
far outnumber all others in the city of Berlin. When 
employment is again to be had, they withdraw from the 
life of shame, if its irregularities have not incapacitated 
them for honorable labor." 

''A third class, one which is more or less typical of 
American prostitution, is made up of those who cannot 
be said to be driven into prostitution either by absolute 
want or by exceptionally pernicious surroundings. They 
may be employed at living wages, but the prospect of 
continuing from year to year with no change from tedi- 
ous and irksome labor creates discontent and eventually 
rebellion. They, too, are impregnated with the view 
that individual happiness is the end of life, and their 
lives bring them no happiness and promise them none. 
Th-e circumstances of city life make it possible for them 



140 I.OOKING FORWARD 

to experiment with immorality without losing such 
social standing, as they may have, and thus many of 
them drift gradually into professional prostitution." 

The prostitute is the helpless victim of modern eco- 
nomic conditions, not industry alone. Among the hun- 
dreds of thousands of saleswomen and typewriters there 
are comparatively few who receive a compensation suf- 
ficient for their support. Fortunate are those of them 
who have parents, or other relatives with whom they 
can live. I know of a large retail house, whose proprie- 
tor in several cases, when the girl asking a situation, 
said that she could not live on the wages offered, 
answered with the cynical question: '^Have you nO' male 
friend to help you out?" 

Undoubtedly there is, as Mr. Johnson says, a large 
class of women, growing up in contaminating, wretched 
surroundings, in poverty and vice. Poverty, however, 
is the crime of society, a crime for which no individual 
in particular can be held responsible. Our economic 
system produces poverty with absolute certainty. There 
may always be reasons why poverty strikes certain per- 
sons, reasons which by no means, always make the per- 
son blameless, but as a general rule, the reasons are 
beyond individual control, and if it is not the one per- 
son, that remains poor, it will be another. Without the 
presence of a poor class the wage system could not exist 
and the existence of poverty is the inevitable conse- 
quence of an economic system in which millions are 
compelled to compete with each other for employment 
bringing not more than a bare living. With equally 
unerring certainty, however, poverty breeds vice and 
crime. 

Equally of an economic character as the reasons are 



PROSTITUTION 141 

which operate on women so as to cause them to offer 
themselves in prostitution, are those which create the 
''demand/' ''A great part of the population of a mod- 
ern city," says Mr. Johnston, "consists of young men 
who have drifted thither from the country and small 
towns, attracted by the greater opportunities of rising 
in social life and by the greater degree of personal com- 
fort that the city offers. As a rule, the income that a 
young man earns, while sufficient to secure a fair degree 
of comfort for himself, does not suffice for founding a 
family. As his income increases, his standard of per- 
sonal comfort rises, accordingly he postpones marriage 
until a date in the indefinite future, or abandons expec- 
tation of it altogether. His interests center almost wholly 
in himself. He is responsible to no one but himself. 
Th^ pleasures that he may obtain from day to day 
become the chief end of his life. It is not unnatural, 
then, that the strongest native impulse of man should 
find expression in the only way open to it — indulgence 

in vice The problem of masculine vice, it will be seen, 

is an integral part of that infinitely complex problem, 
the "Social Question." 

Having discussed this phase of sexual relation in the 
chapter on the family, I need not discuss it again. But 
a few words in reference to the drifting of young men 
from the country and small towns into the larger cities 
are in place here. The rapid growth of the cities and 
the gradual depopulation of the country is a modern 
phenomenon. We meet with this shifting of popula- 
tion in all civilized countries which have an extensive 
industry. The young men do not drift into the cities, 
they are driven there. Industrial and commercial estab- 
lishments locate in large cities which offer to them many 



142 LOOKING FORWARD 

advantages, especially facilities of transportation. Mod- 
ern industry requires the concentration of a large army 
of workingmen and workingwomen at one point, so that 
periodical discharge and re-employment create no embar- 
rassment. At the same time the use of modern agri- 
cultural implements and machinery is constantly increas- 
ing, and in proportion to its increase the number of 
human hands required for agricultural work grows 
smaller. Undoubtedly the opportunities of social life 
and the greater degree of personal comfort, as well as 
the pleasures which the city offers, are a strong attrac- 
tion, but not strong enough to depopulate the country in 
the measure in which it is depopulated. It is lack of 
opportunity of employment which is the cause of the 
steady pilgrimage of the rural population toward the 
city. It is an economic cause pure and simple; the 
growth of the urban population and the consequential 
decrease of the rural population are the direct effect of 
modern industrialism. The factories locate in or near 
the large cities, the merchant, the banker, the insurance 
company, and so forth, follow, and after them comes the 
great throng of employment seekers, many of whom re- 
main unemployed even in the most prosperous times, 
although the personnel of the unemployed constantly 
changes. 

To describe the moral, effect of this massing together 
of hundreds of thousands of people in a comparatively 
small area is hardly necessary. In the country and the 
small town everybody knows everybody else, everybody 
is under the observation of his neighbor and under the 
influence of his neighbor's opinion. In the large city 
the individual disappears in the mass, one frequently 
does not know one's next door neighbors; one does not 



PROSTITUTION 143 

look after the private life of even one's close friends, 
and a few minutes' ride brings one to parts of a city 
where one is as much a stranger as in another part of 
the world. Thus, moral transgression may be easily 
concealed and prostitution immensely facilitated. But 
all of this is merely secondary. The primary cause of 
prostitution is in the economic system. Newspapers 
may write against it, clergymen may preach against it, 
sociologists and physicians may point out its dangers to 
society and public health, lawmakers and police officials 
may unite their efforts in attempts to regulate or sup- 
press it, it will all be in vain as long as our present eco- 
nomic system lasts. Because an economic system which 
results in a condition of extreme wealth and extreme 
povert}' side by side, in a condition of extreme precari- 
ousness of existence for millions of people, especially 
women, and in a condition which produces a steady 
decrease of the number of marriages by reason of posi- 
tive or relative inability to support a family, is bound 
to produce prostitution. Even if the death penalty were 
meted out for it, that could no more prevent prostitu- 
tion than in the time of queen Elizabeth the hanging 
and branding of vagabonds could prevent vagabondage. 
And just as in the middle ages vagabondage, as pro- 
duced by feudal institutions was the prolific source of 
prostitution, so it is in our times the cheerless, uncer- 
tain and generally hopeless condition of the wage work- 
ers, as produced by modern economic institutions. 

A discussion of the effects of prostitution, or^ of laws 
and police measures by which its obtrusiveness and its 
dangers may be lessened, is foreign to the objects of 
this book. The New York Committee of Fifteen rec- 
ommends the treatment of prostitution as a sin, not as 



14:4 I.OOKING FORWARD 

a crime, and as an outline of a policy toward minimizing 
its evil submits the following: 

"First, strenuous efforts to prevent in the tenement 
houses the overcrowding Vv^hich is the prolific source of 
sexual immorality. The attempts to provide better 
housing for the poor, praiseworthy and deserving of 
recognition as they are, have as yet produced but a fee- 
ble impression upon existing conditions, and are but the 
bare beginnings of a work which should be enlarged 
and continued with unflagging vigor and devotion. If 
we wish to abate the social evil, we must attack it at its 
source. 

Secondly, the furnishing, by public provision or 
private munificence, of purer and more elevating forms 
of amusement to supplant the attractions of the low 
dance halls, theaters and other similar places of enter- 
tainment that only serve to stimulate sensuality and to 
debase the taste. The pleasures of the people need to 
be looked after far more earnestly than has been the 
case hitherto. 

I may add in this connection that I have frequently 
wondered why self-respecting women do not raise an 
eflfective protest against the grossly indelicate and 
oflfensive pictures which are posted by a certain class 
of theaters. They serve a mean purpose and are an in- 
sult to every decent woman. 

Thirdly, whatever can be done to improve the mater- 
ial conditions of the wage earning women, will be 
directly in line with the purpose which is here kept in 
view. It is a sad and humiliating admission to make, 
at the opening of the twentieth century, in one of the 
greatest centers of civilization in the world, that in num- 
erous instances, it is not passion, or corrupt inclination 



PROSTITUTION 145 

but the force of actual physical want, that impels young 
women to go along the road to ruin/* 

Although the committee makes these recommenda- 
tions especially for the city of New York, they are 
equally good for any other city, and perhaps include 
everything that can be done in the way of melioration 
and reform, as long as the banishment of the evil is an 
impossibility. 



VI. 

The State. 

To us who live in the twentieth century, nothing will 
appear more simple and natural than the existence of 
the state, so much so that few of us can imagine that 
there ever was a time in w^hich such an institution did 
not exist. Much less are they able to apprehend the 
possibility of the ending of this institution. To them 
social and civil order has ever appeared in the form of 
state government, they are unable to conceive of any 
other order, and the abeence of state government is in 
their minds equivalent to anarchy. To the student of 
history and ethnography, however, the state is not more 
than one form in the evolution of the organization of 
human society. It had a beginning and may have an 
end. The student easily comprehends that at some 
future time the State may be supplanted by another and 
probably higher and better form of organization. 

The State is an agglomeration of human individuals, 
located and domiciled within a certain territory, under 
laws and regulations having force only within that terri- 
tory, irrespective of the personal relations of those in- 
dividuals. It owes its birth to the growth of the insti- 
tution of private ownership in land, and the increase of 
chattel property and private property interests in gen- 
eral, the protection of which became its principal func- 
tion. The ancient gentile organization, based upon per- 
sonal relations only, was efficient enough for the pro- 

146 



the: stat^ 147 

tection of persons, but was too feeble for the protection 
of property interests which at the beginning of civili- 
zation had become vast, numerous and complicated. It 
must by no means be supposed that the State supplanted 
the ancient personal organization at a given moment in 
a perfected condition. On the contrary, it grew up by 
degrees. It took centuries of wrestling and battling 
with the evils of the time until the solution of the, what 
we might call social problem, was found in the creation 
of political government, founded upon territory. In all 
probability the solution of our own social problem will 
likewise not be the result of a sudden discovery or in- 
vention, but rather of continued successive application 
of many remedies with more or less incomplete effect. 

The transition from an organization founded upon 
person to an organization founded upon territory, was 
too great a revolution, as to have by any possibility taken 
place all at once. One of the steps leading up to the 
creation of the state was the recognition of the economic 
classes by the law, making them political classes by 
distributing among them in different proportions the 
powers of government. 

The ancient purely democratic institutions had dis- 
appeared long before the creation of the state. With 
the introduction of private ownership in land and of 
slavery complete democracy became an impossibiHty. 
Grecian democracy, which we hear so exultingly praised 
by historians, was really no democracy in the modern 
sense of the word, because it embraced only part of the 
people. Those who did the work of the nation did not 
belong to the "demos," that is the people, but were 
property. So it was with the ''populus romanus." Slaves 
and those belonging to subjected tribes or nations be- 



148 I^OOKING FORWARD 

came no part of the ruling tribe and were accorded no 
civil rights in the state for a long time. 

The state started out with political classes already 
existing, their creation was a step preparatory to its own 
creation. The economic class is not like the political 
class the manifestation of the human will, it is the crea- 
ture of conditions. Whenever and wherever the eco-- 
nomic conditions are of such a nature that thej create 
dififerences of wealth, those possessing great wealth 
grow into power and influence by the mere operation of 
conditions, whereafter by the mere effect of human 
nature, they use their power and influence toward pre- 
serving the institutions from which they derive both 
wealth and power. They shape legislation in their own 
favor and create political classes by recognizing the eco- 
nomic classes. The economic class is the fundamental 
basis of the political class. Whenever an economic class 
receives governmental prerogatives by legislation, it 
becomes a political class. 

In England, the political classes were called states, 
in France etats, in Germany Stande. 'The lay part of 
his majesty's subjects, or such as are not comprehended 
under the denomination of clergy, may be divided,'' says 
Blackstone, ''into three distinct states, the civil, the mil- 
itary, and the maritime. The civil state consists of 
the nobility and the commonalty. The nobility consists 
of dukes, marquesses, earls, viscounts and barons," the 
commonalty of knights of the garter (and some other 
kinds of knights), esquires, yeomen, tradesmen and so 
forth. 

Already in the mythical time of Theseus, long before 
the establishment of the Athenian state, the Athenians 
were divided into three classes, the Eupatrldae or "well 



THE state; 149 

born/' the Geomori or husbandmen and the Demiurgi 
or artisans, with the rights and powers of each well 
defined. But under Solon a new division was made, not 
according to callings, but according to property owned. 
The people were divided into four classes according to 
the measure of their wealth; each class was invested 
with certain powers, and upon each were imposed cer- 
tain obligations. Of these four classes, those only 
belonging to the first were eligible to the high offices, 
the others performed different grades of military ser- 
vice, and were eligible to minor offices. Military ser- 
vices in those times were considered more of a privilege 
than a duty, only freemen being allowed to bear arms. 
To the first class, called "Pentakosiomedimnoi" (500- 
measure-men) belonged those who harvested at least 
five hundred measures (medimnoi) of barley or a quan- 
tity of oil or wine of the same value, which was esti- 
mated equal to a taxing capital of six thousand 
drachms. To the second class belonged those harvesting 
from three hundred to five hundred measures of barley, 
considered equivalent to a capital of thirty-six hundred 
drachms; they were called Hippeis ('knights, horsemen). 
The third class, the Zeugitai, harvested from a hundred 
and fifty to three hundred measures of barley and pos- 
sessed a team of mules; eighteen hundred drachms was 
considered the value of their possessions; the fourth 
class, the Thetes had a yield of less than one hundred 
and fifty measures. The division into districts of the 
Athenian territory followed soon after by the legisla- 
tion of Cleisthenes. 

Rome entered upon its state career in a quite similar 
manner. By the legislation, known as that of Servius 
Tullius in the sixth century before Christ, and very soon 



150 I.OOKING FORWARD 

after the legislation of Solon in Attica, the people were 
divided into five classes, and the city was divided into 
districts for governmental purposes. The division into 
classes was made according to the value of their property, 
and each class was possessed of a certain number of 
votes in the popular assembly. The people voted by 
centuries, each century having one vote. The number 
of centuries, of which there were altogether one hun- 
dred and ninety-three, was arbitrarily fixed for each 
class, without regard to the actual number of members, 
and it was so arranged that the wealthiest class had the 
largest number of centuries and a majority of all the 
votes. 

The first class consisted of those who had a fortune 
of one hundred thousand aces, equal to about sixteen 
hundred dollars, and formed, together with eighteen 
centuries of equites, or heavily armed horsemen, ninety- 
eight centuries; they had that many votes out of one 
hundred and ninety-three. The second class, with a for- 
tune of seventy-five thousand aces, counted twenty 
centuries ; the third, to which belonged those with a for- 
tune of fifty thousand aces, counted also twenty centu- 
ries; the fifth with twelve thousand five hundred aces 
was divided into thirty centuries. All these centuries 
had to serve in war and provide for their own arma- 
ments, which were according to the class of different 
character. To the second class belonged also two cent- 
uries of artisans; namely, sword-smiths and carpenters, 
and to the fourth class belonged two centuries of horn- 
blowers and trumpeters. The rest of the people, called 
proletarians (possessors of children), all of them to- 
gether formed one century, had consequently only one 



THE state; 151 

vote in the popular assembly, and neither paid taxes, 
nor served in war. 

The figures show that fortunes were small, com- 
pared with those of our times, and the valuations 
according to the yield in barley, oil or wine are instruct- 
ive in reference to what the principal occupations were. 

In a certain sense new legislation is always the rec- 
ognition of already existing conditions. It is not to be 
supposed that either the legislation of Solon, or that of 
Servius Tullius had been possible, if wealth had not al- 
ready had gradually and steadily gained for its owners 
so much power and influence that the new order did not 
materially change the prevalent conditions, but only 
gave legal sanction to the more subtle effect of condi- 
tions, and brought order into chaos. At any rate, we 
are not able to learn, either from history or tradition, 
that at the time of this legislation there was any violent 
opposition to it, which would, in all probability, have 
been the case, if the power and influence of the wealthy 
classes had not already existed without such legislation. 
Probably the idea of ^'noblesse oblige" had already then 
entered into the minds of the legislators, wherefore 
expensive duties were imposed on the new political 
classes, and the military duties were assigned to them 
with regard to the costliness of the outfit. In Greece, 
for instance, the second class had to serve as cavalry, 
the third as heavily armed infantry, while the fourth 
had to bear light arms. 

The economic classes existed and obtained political 
prerogatives, in Greece as well as in Rome, prior to the 
creation of the state, thereby being transformed into po- 
litical classes, and the state based its governmental ar- 
rangements on their existence. More than two thousand 



152 IvOOKING FORWARD 

years later it discovered that, for the use of the power and 
influence of wealth, the political class was of no neces- 
sity at all, and that a wealthy economic class may be 
powerful and influential enough to rule a country with- 
out legal privileges. 

Although prior to the institution of private owner- 
ship in land, and the use of agricultural products as 
articles of trade and commerce, there were persons of 
greater influence than others, and, perhaps possessing 
certain privileges, these privileges never extended so 
far as to give those persons a greater share in the fruits 
of labor or war. They gave honor and influence but 
not wealth. And although even then theoretically elect- 
ive positions of chiefs or leaders in war remained very 
often as a matter of custom in one family, yet, such 
favorable positions were generally the result of personal 
service and distinction, and so long as there was a com- 
munity of material interests, and therefore, private for- 
tunes could not be accumulated, no conditions existed 
which could produce classes. Such conditions arose 
after the establishment of private ownership in land. 

The political classes once established, did, of course, 
everything in their power for the purpose of securing 
themselves in their commanding position. A French 
adage says : I'appetit vient en mangeant. The more 
privileges they had, the more they wanted. They owed 
their position to wealth, and they soon found that to 
maintain themselves in it and to increase their privi- 
leges they required more wealth. Consequently they did 
what was quite natural for them to do, they used their 
privileges to enrich themselves. They made wars of con- 
quest, subjected .whole nations, appropriated their land 
and made the people their slaves. Land and slaves 



THE STATE 153 

were the principal property in the ancient world, and 
also the principal means of production. Possession of 
land and slaves gave power. History teaches us that 
in all times those who possessed most of the things 
which at the time formed the wealth of the country, 
constituted the ruling class. 

In slavery times when slaves formed the principal 
kind of property, the slave holders were the ruling class. 
In the middle ages when land was the principal kind of 
property, the land possessing class, the feudal lords, 
were the ruling class; and in our times the capitalists 
are the ruling class, because of the power of the capital 
which they possess. 

In the beginning the power was exercised under the 
forms of democracy. Greece as well as Rome entered 
statehood as democracies. This assertion may seem con- 
trary to Roman history, but history has. in all probabil- 
ity made a mistake by calling the Greek basileus and the 
Roman rex kings. They surely were no kings in the 
modern sense of the word. Although it is not quite 
clear what their functions were, their powers were cer- 
tainly very limited. The basileus and the rex were 
chiefs in war and performed, probably, judicial and 
clerical functions besides. I have no doubt that their 
offices were very much like that of the Hebrew shofet, 
which is translated with judge, a translation which 
seems to me arbitrary and misleading. For what we 
learn of the judges in the scriptures points much more 
to military than to judicial functions. There is no more 
justification for translating names of offices than there 
is for translating names of persons. By giving an an- 
cient office a modern name, we impart to it a modern 
character which it did not have. The modern concep- 



154 LOOKING FORWARD 

tion of king is quite different from even the ancient 
German and Anglo-Saxon conception of it. The old 
Saxon word for it was cuning, and the Anglo-Saxon 
cyng. Its derivation is from the Saxon cunni, mean- 
ing family, or house in a personal sense. The Saxon 
cunni was probably the same institution as the Roman 
gens or the Grecian genos, so that presumably, the cyng 
was not more than the chief of a cunni, or gens. From 
'^Historia Franconium" (history of the Franks) by 
Gregory, bishop of Tours, we learn that even as late as 
in the sixth century the Franconian kings were power- 
less in almost everything without the assent of the as- 
sembly of the free Franks. We are told of king Chilp- 
erich that he once claimed from the booty of war a 
vessel, taken from a church, for himself for the purpose 
of returning it to the church, whereupon a common 
warrior stepped from the ranks, told the king that he 
could have no more than what fell to him by lot and 
smashed the vessel with his battle ax. The king was 
helpless, but later on took his revenge. 

Gradually the forms of democracy were cast aside 
and monarchical institutions were firmly established. 
More and more, legislation was directed toward keeping 
the masses of the people in poverty and making them 
believe that the little they had, they owed to the good 
will and generosity of the upper classes. The evolu- 
tion of the principle of class-government, coupled with 
the institution of slavery culminated in Rome politically 
in Caesarism, and economically in the creation of lati- 
fundia, or immense landed estates, in the hands of a 
comparatively small class. The mass of the people con- 
sisted partly of slaves and partly of absolutely property- 



THE STATE 155 

less citizens and non-producing free proletarians main- 
tained at public cost. 

Somewhat similar was the course of development in 
Russia where Caesarism exists to this day, but is grad- 
ually undermined by the growth of modern industry, 
the workingmen being the most rebellious of the Tsar's 
subjects. 

Under the frightful conditions growing up under 
Roman Caesarism, slave labor soon proved not produc- 
tive enough and with the fall of the Roman empire and 
the rise of German power came the creation of the 
feudal state in which theoretically all the land belonged 
to the king, who was at the top of the feudal ladder, 
while at the foot of it there was the great mass of land- 
less and propertyless workers. 

Far up into the middle ages land-hunger was one of 
the characteristics of the privileged classes, because 
land was still the principal kind of property. It was as 
late as in the fifteenth century that in England the en- 
closure of the commons began. Up to that time there 
were still many lands in the kingdom held in common 
and used for agriculture and pasturage, upon which 
thousands and thousands made their living. Bacon in 
his *'Henry VIII" says : "Enclosures at that time began 
to be more frequent, whereby arable land which could 
not be manured without people and families was turned 
into pasture, which was easily rid by a few herdsmen; 
and the tenancies for years, lives, and at will, where- 
upon much of the yeomanry lived, were turned into 
demesnes." 

'Therefore," says Thomas More in the preface to 
his Utopia, "that one covetous and insatiable cormorant 
and very plague of his native country may compass 



156 I.OOKING FORWARD 

about and enclose many thousands acres of ground to- 
gether within one pale or hedge, the husbandmen be 
thrust out of their own, or else by coveyn and fraud, or 
by violent oppression, they be put besides it, or by 
wrongs and injustices they be so worried that they be 
compelled to sell all; by one means therefore, or by 
other, either by hook or by crook, they must needs de- 
part away poor, silly, wretched souls, men, women, hus- 
bands, wives, fatherless children, widows, woeful moth- 
ers with their young babes, and their whole household, 
small in substance, and much in number, as husbandry 
requireth many hands. All their household stuff, which 
is worth very little, they be constrained to sell for a 
thing of naught. And when they have wandered about 
till that be spent, what can they than else do but steal, 
and then justly, pardy, be hanged or else go about a 
begging? And yet then, also, they be cast into prisons 
as vagabonds, because they go about and work not; 
whom no man will set a work though they never so will- 
ingly proffer themselves thereto. For one shepherd or 
herdman is enough to eat up that ground with cattle to 
the occupying whereof about husbandry many hands 
were requisite." 

Thus did the ruling classes in England steal even 
the land of their own people, in a time when agriculture 
was the principal pursuit, and then flogged, imprisoned, 
branded and hanged vagabonds and beggars. 

Although history does not disclose any violent oppo- 
sition against the establishment of privileged classes, yet 
sometime after their establishment the inevitable and 
endless class-struggles began and continued in differ- 
ent forms, as economic conditions changed, up to and 
within our own time. There were periods when they 



the; state; 157 

culminated in open rebellion, violent insurrection or 
great revolution. The slave-revolt under Spartacus and 
the frequent violent outbreaks between patricians and 
plebeians in Rome, the great uprisings of the peasants in 
the middle ages almost everywhere in Europe, the insur- 
rections under Wat Tyler, Jack Cade and Robert Kett 
in England, the revolution of 1789 in France, etc., are 
specimens of the culminations of the everlasting class- 
struggles. 

The progress of the world and the growth of civi- 
lization marked the development of a new economic 
class, that of the craftsmen. The artisan gained in im- 
portance as wealth, luxury and comfort increased. In 
the growing cities they gradually became a power and, 
by acquiring prerogatives and privileges, a distinct polit- 
ical class, which grew in wealth and influence, as the 
cities freed themselves from the power of the feudal 
lords. It was not yet the time when a purely economic 
class could rule without privileges. For, the methods 
of production were still too simple. The work was done 
by handicraft, the tools were few, simple and easily 
accessible, and the principal means of production was 
the producer's skill. Gradually, however, conditions 
changed. First there came a change in the immediate 
object of production. 

Originally, the object of production was home-con- 
sumption. In earlier times the producer consumed his 
own product, and an exchange took place only when the 
fruits of one's toil exceeded the producer's own needs. 
Man produced what he needed for himself. This mode 
of production was in course of time so thoroughly rev- 
olutionized that the producer of to-day does not produce 
that which he needs, but that which he does not need 



158 I^OOKING FORWARD 

himself. The modern producer produces what he can- 
not consume himself. He produces for sale and buys 
with the proceeds what he intends to consume. He sel- 
dom knows the consumer of his product and does not 
personally come in contact with him. The craftsman 
and artisan of the middle ages did not produce for their 
own consumption either, but they produced directly for 
the consumer, whom they knew and who was their cus- 
tomer. 

As early as in the fourteenth century we find produc- 
tion for the purpose of exchange and commerce; goods 
were even carried from one country into the other. It 
sounds quite strange when we read to-day that England 
sold wool, hides and grain to the wealthy cities of Flan- 
ders, and took wine, oil, spices and certain manufactured 
goods in exchange for them. The ships of the great 
Mediterranean republics often found their way to Eng- 
lish ports. These republics established overland routes 
between India and Europe and carried the products of 
one continent to the other. The exchange of goods re- 
ceived an immense impetus by the remarkable discov- 
eries of the fifteenth century; in 1492 that of the West 
Indies, in 1497 ^hat of Newfoundland and Florida, in 
the same year that of the ocean way around the Cape 
of Good Hope, in 1499 that of Brazil. Then followed 
in the early part of the sixteenth century the conquests 
of Cuba, Mexico and Peru, during which it became quite 
doubtful who were the real savages, the conquerors or 
the vanquished, for the conduct of the civilized Christian 
Spaniards was certainly more savage and barbaric than 
that of the heathenish aborigines. Very often it seems 
to me that even to this day the savage nature of man is 
still slumbering in civilized man, and is awakened and 



THE STATE 159 

drawn from its recess by the lust for gold. Modern civi- 
lization falls into hysterics at the sight of individual 
misfortune or great accidental calamity, and at the same 
time goes into man-killing wars of conquest, starts col- 
onies in murderous climates, treats their original inhab- 
itants with cruel barbarism, sends soldiers there to be 
either slain or killed by malaria; and does it merely for 
the purpose of extending trade and making large prof- 
its. All of which would be, of course, impossible, if 
there were not a propertyless class, ready at all times 
to do the work of the property holding class, no matter 
of what nature it is, and if the mode of production was 
not such that it produces and constantly reproduces such 
a poor class. 

The building of better ships and the discovery of the 
advantages which lay in the division of labor was fol- 
lowed by a slow and gradual, but steady, growth of in- 
dustry and commerce. Great wealth was accumulated, 
and history has preserved the names of some great com- 
mercial houses, such as the Welsers and the Fuggers 
in Augsburg, who possessed fabulous riches. But then 
came the era of great inventions, the utilization of forces 
of nature, hitherto unknown, the wonderful progress of 
chemistry, the facilitation of commerce by new means 
of transportation, and industry and commerce took on 
proportions which threw everything that existed before 
into insignificance. 

This stupendous growth and expansion had a re- 
markable effect on the classes. It produced that purely 
economic class which to-day rules over all civilized 
countries, and abolished or rendered insignificant the 
political or privileged classes. It was a simple economic 
process. It was the necessary and unavoidable effect 



160 I^OOKING FORWARD 

of the separation of the producer from the means of 
production. The invention of the Bteam engine marked 
the final outgoing of the artisan's shop and the firm 
estabhshment of the factory system, a process which had 
already begun with the introduction of systematic divi- 
sion of labor. The means, or say tools, of production 
grew more expensive from day to day; it was not any 
longer within the possibilities of everybody to procure 
them, and the great mass of the producers became wage- 
workers. In proportion as capital grew, it needed more 
freedom for its undertakings, and it brushed aside with 
a powerful hand all legal restraints and restrictions. 
Class privileges had become a hindrance to the opera- 
tions of capital. It needed as workers men and women 
free in the sale of their labor force. It therefore in- 
vented, and raised to a great moral principle, the doc- 
trine of free trade, meaning perfect freedom of trade, 
the Manchester theory of ^^laissez faire, laissez aller." 
It said to the government: ''Hands off from my opera- 
tions,'' and forced the government to protect it in its 
freedom of operation, violating without any scruples its 
own principles by the institution of protective and even 
prohibitive tariff-duties where it suited its purposes. 

When the philosophy of the second half of the 
eighteenth century promulgated ''les droits de Thomme," 
the inalienable rights of man, as they were called in the 
American declaration of independence, it had not dis- 
covered a new moral principle, but stated in the form of 
a moral rule what had become the economic necessity 
of the time. It was not the great moral principle of 
the right of a nation to legislate for itself that started 
the American revolution, but it was the practical eco- 



the: state 161 

nomic principle of no taxation without representation 
which did it. 

In the French revolution as well as in the Amer- 
ican, it was the '^bourgeoisie/^ the possessing class, that 
was the revolutionary element. The revolutions of the 
eighteenth and nineteenth centuries were all ''bourgeois" 
revolutions, having for their objects the abolition of the 
prerogatives of the privileged classes, the "states,'' the 
"etats,'' the "stande." There existed as yet no eco- 
nomic class which ruled without legal privileges. The 
signers of the declaration of independence honestly be- 
lieved that the extinction of political classes was all that 
was needed to establish "liberty, equality and frater- 
nity," and that a republican form of government was 
perfectly sufficient to establish a permanent era of gen- 
eral happiness. The power and influence of purely eco- 
nomic classes was unknown to them; it was not thought 
that a class could rule the state without being by the 
law especially empowered to do so. The mode of phil- 
osophy in those times was entirely deductive, and the 
greatest thinkers believed in the truth and power of a 
priori principles. They could see no reason why, if all 
men were declared free and equal and a constitutional 
and legal edifice was erected upon that proposition, all 
men should not really be free and equal and enjoy the 
fruits of freedom and equality as established in constitu- 
tional maxims and legal formulae. The power of wealth 
was for them so completely concealed behind the easily 
observable power of class-privilege, the economic class 
was so completely veiled by the privileged class, and 
the belief that the elimination of legal class-privileges 
was bound of necessity to be followed b}^ the acme of 
freedom was so strong, that they surrounded the con- 



162 LOOKING FORWARD 

stitution of the newly created Union with almost uncon- 
querable guards. 

It is almost needless to say that the freedom which a 
Thomas Jefferson and a Patrick Henry had in their 
minds, and which they felt sure of creating, does not 
to-day exist. If they had been told that in consequence 
of, and under the protection of the freedom established 
by them, a class would grow up which, without titles 
and privileges, would rule the country by sheer force of 
wealth and economic conditions, and that the class, suf- 
fering under this rule, would find in the constitution 
of the United States, built upon those principles of free- 
dom, an obstacle in their struggle for bettering their 
condition ; if they had been told that their maxims of lib- 
erty, as laid down in the constitution, would, in some 
future time, receive an interpretation which through 
theories of property and contract rights, would handicap 
a lower class in its struggle for freedom, they would not 
have comprehended it, and if they had, would not have 
found means to prevent it. Yet, such is the case to-day, 
and the class which rules by sheer force of wealth, with- 
out titles and privileges, exists, not only in this country, 
but in all civilized countries. It rules whether the form 
of government is republican or monarchical, whether 
titles exist or not, whether political classes still retain a 
shadow of their former prerogatives or not. Where this 
class exists, kingly power has been so reduced that the 
principal difference between a modern monarchy and a 
modern republic is only this, that in the one the office 
of the chief of the nation is hereditary, in the other 
elective. As a matter of principle I certainly prefer the 
republican form of government to the monarchical. My 
sentiment, indeed, is thoroughly republican, but I do not 



THE STATE 163 

believe, as many seem to believe, that republican forms 
alone are sufficient to guarantee any degree of liberty. 
Our republican forms did not prevent us from main- 
taining through a whole century of our independence 
the institution of slavery, nor do they prevent us to-day 
from establishing imperial government over foreign peo- 
ples. In the republic of France titles are still existing 
and the middle and South American republics are mere 
parodies on republicanism. It was not different in 
ancient times. The democratical institutions of Greece 
and its republican forms of government, as well as those 
of primitive Rome, formed no obstacle to the mainte- 
nance of slavery. The laws of Draco in the ancient 
republic of Attica were said to have been written with 
blood, the republic of Venice had a government as des- 
potic as one can be imagined and that of Genoa was 
thoroughly aristocratic. Upon the other hand, as to the 
peoples' rights and liberty, there is very little material 
difference between the constitutional monarchies of 
Europe and the modern republics. The German emperor 
cannot veto any law passed by the Reichstag and the 
Bundesrath, but the president of the United States may 
veto any law passed by Congress. The king of Eng- 
land, after having appointed his council and govern- 
ment, can neither appoint nor remove a civil officer, 
whereas the president of the United States has the im- 
mense prerogative of appointing and removing an army 
of civil officers. If one considers the enormous influence 
hidden in this prerogative, it is not too much to say 
that the president of the United States wields a greater 
power than most of the European monarchs. On paper, 
kings, perhaps, possess greater rights in reference to 
war and peace, whereas the constitution of the United 



164 LOOKING FORWARD 

States lays the power of declaring war exclusively into 
the hands of Congress. But declarations of war have 
somewhat gone out of fashion. Wars are, in our days, 
commenced without declaration, which follows after- 
wards as a mere matter of form and our president, 
being the commander-in-chief of the army and navy, 
as kings and emperors are, has the practical power of 
making war without waiting for a declaration of war 
from Congress. Did not the American government par- 
ticipate in the Boxer war in China only a few years ago 
without ever asking the permission of Congress ? Were 
not, under President Harrison, American marines 
landed in Honolulu and the country taken possession of 
without even the knowledge of Congress? The Ger- 
man, the English and the Italian press criticize the gov- 
ernment as freely as the American press, only the king's 
person is protected against insult by severe laws. True, 
the president is, in this respect, at a disadvantage; the 
American citizen has the privilege of saying nasty 
things of the president. This privilege, however, seems 
to me to be of very doubtful value, and one of which 
well bred people are not apt to make use anyway. 

Gibbon begins the third chapter of his ''Decline and 
Fall of the Roman Empire'' as follows : "The obvious 
definition of a monarchy seems to be that of a state in 
which a single person by whatever name he may be des- 
ignated, is entrusted with the execution of the laws, 
the management of the revenue and the command of 
the army." It seems to me that this defi lition fits the 
United States not less than any modern constitutional 
monarchy. 

Further on in the same chapter the g^reat historian 
says : "The consul or the tribune might have reigned 



THE STATE 165 

in peace. The title of the king had armed the Romans 
against his life. Augustus was sensible that mankind is 
governed by names." 

The distinguishing feature of modern self-govern- 
ment is not the republican but the parliamentary form, 
including the right of budget, the right of holding the 
purse-string, the right of taxation and the right of ap- 
propriation. This right is held to-day by the people in 
constitutional monarchies as well as in republics. It is 
the people's right par excellence, without which all other 
rights would be of no value whatever. It is the right, 
the absence of which marks in our days absolutism or 
despotism as a form of government. Whatever prerog- 
atives the crown may have, as long as the use of them 
depends on the willingness or unwillingness of the peo- 
ple to bear the expense and to tax themselves with it, 
the real power, theoretically, is in the hands of the peo- 
ple. The right to grant or refuse taxes and appropria- 
tions is of an economic character and is, therefore, 
entirely in consonance with the character of the eco- 
nomic class which to-day rules the world and presides 
over the destinies of nations. Even governments like 
the Russian must bow before it and concede to it at 
least so much as giving an account of its resources and 
expenditures, for otherwise it could not borrow a cent. 
InabiHty to borrow, however, would be a very serious 
matter in an age in which state-debts have grown to be 
permanent institutions. Whatever differences there may 
be between constitutional monarchies and republics in 
minor matters, and in matters of form, in this material 
point they are alike. The absence of political freedom 
in a people is principally marked by the power of the 
government to tax the people at will and to use its 



166 U)OKING FORWARD 

resources without accounting for them to the people. 
It was taxation without representation which caused the 
American colonies to free themselves from English rule, 
but the Englishman, who is as liberty-loving as the 
American, is loyal to the crown. The German govern- 
ment cannot borrow a cent, nobody will loan it a cent, 
it can spend nothing without the consent of the Reichs- 
tag, and compared with this power of the people's rep- 
resentatives, all other matters in which republics may 
differ from monarchies appear to be mere trifles. Even 
the hereditary right of the nobility of some European 
monarchies, as for instance Great Britain and Prussia, 
to occupy the seats in the upper houses of their legisla- 
tive bodies, is unable to check the will of those holding 
the keys to the coffers of the nation. 

But the compulsory military service! Is not that an 
institution, violating every principle of liberty? Perhaps 
it is, but it is not a distinguishing feature between mon- 
archism and republicanism. Monarchical England has 
no compulsory military service, and republican France 
has. And who knows, but we would have it in the 
United States also, if, instead of forming one great 
nation, covering almost the whole continent, we formed 
a half-dozen or dozen nations, each inhabiting a part of 
our territory, and all being jealous of each other. It is 
generally acknowledged that municipal government in 
the European constitutional monarchies is better and 
more honest than in our republic, that there is less cor- 
ruption and that politics is cleaner; and as there is no 
reason to believe that the European is more honest than 
the American, the reason must be somewhere in our 
governmental system. 

The modern bourgeoisie, a purely economic class 



THE STATE 167 

without constitutional prerogatives and legal privileges, 
possessing the wealth of the nations, manipulating it in 
industry, commerce and transportation, exploiting phys- 
ical and intellectual human labor force and the forces of 
nature as well as the treasures stored up in the bosom 
of our planet, makes history and shapes the destinies 
of nations, and, queer enough, does it all in the name 
of freedom. In those times when land was the chief 
source of wealth and power, dynasties and powerful 
families indulged in warfare for the purpose of absorb- 
ing the lands of other nations. To-day dynastic wars 
have almost become an impossibility, because more is to 
be gained by trading with a nation than by robbing it of 
its land. The question of the open door has become of 
greater importance than the question of whose domains 
a country shall form a part. 

The bourgeois class, composed of merchants, manu- 
facturers, bankers, capitalists, etc., the tiers etat, the 
third estate, as it was called in ante-revolution times of 
France, has in numerous revolutions in different coun- 
tries overthrown feudalistic institutions and has become 
the ruling class of our time. It is sufficient for the pur- 
poses of this book to state that it rules in republics and 
monarchies alike, without entering into a discussion of 
the psychological and political process of the growth of 
its power and influence, interesting as the subject might 
be. A few facts, however, I will mention, too obvious 
to need any explanation. First, that parliamentarism, 
coupled even with universal suffrage (women are not 
yet counted), has not been able to prevent this class 
from exercising an almost exclusive influence on elec- 
tions, appointments, legislation, administration of justice 
and the policy of the government, the large mass of the 



168 IvOOKING FORWARD 

people, so far, having consciously or unconsciously sub- 
mitted to the will of that class. Second, that a ruling 
clas5 cannot exist without a ruled class, and that, 
although there are isolated cases of poor workingmen 
acquiring, under specially fortunate circumstances, 
great wealth, and thereby rising out of their class, the 
present mode of production and distribution could not 
exist without a large class of propertyless men and 
women, dependent for work and a living upon the class 
possessing the instruments of labor. Third, that our 
law takes no knowledge of the existence of economic 
classes, because such classes have no legal prerogatives ; 
that in the eyes of the law all citizens are free and 
equal; that legal theories prevail over actual conditions; 
that the theories of law are out of harmony with actual 
relations; and that, therefore, freedom and equality are 
only legal fictions. 

The reason for this is that economic conditions 
change more rapidly than legal and political institutions, 
the latter following only very slowly the continuous evo~ 
lution of economics, and adjusting themselves only by 
degrees and in long intervals to economic changes, often, 
as history teaches, not without violent convulsions in 
human society. There can be no question that unre- 
strained competition produced many evils, yet one would 
in vain seek for any deep impressions of these evils 
upon our laws or even upon the tendency of new leg- 
islation, except in efforts to suppress child labor. 

Legislation of the last century is all based upon the 
theory that competition is an unmixed blessing. Although 
it has been quite evident for some time that the tendency 
of economic evolution is toward its elimination, legisla- 
tion fails to see in the uninterrupted and irresistible 



THE STATIC 169 

growth of concentration and combination in commerce 
and industry a general social movement. It insists upon 
proceeding on the old theory of the necessity and use- 
fulness of competition, and instead of adjusting itself 
to the new conditions, it attempts to oppose them and to 
preserve institutions beyond which the development of 
economic conditions has advanced. 

As a consequence thereof we are witnesses to the 
peculiar phenomenon that under legal maxims of free- 
dom and equality, conditions are defended and upheld 
which practically destroy freedom and equality, because 
these maxims owe their existence to economic condi- 
tions no longer prevalent. When the constitution of 
this country was formed, a century and a quarter ago, 
America was an agricultural country. There were no 
steam engines, no gas engines, no electric motors; there 
were no locomotives, no railroads, no steamships, no 
street cars. Mills and factories, such as now fill our 
country, existed nowhere. We exported some natural 
products and imported most articles of industry. What 
a tremendous change within not much more than a cen- 
tury! If the framers of our constitution would rise 
from their graves, they would not know the face of the 
country in which they were born, lived and died. Con- 
sidering the different economic positions of employer 
and employed, it appears almost impossible to frame any 
law affecting both equally. Yet, when any legislative 
attempt is made to remedy a condition recognized as 
injurious to the freedom of action of the employee, the 
remedy, in the nature of things, injuriously affecting 
the employer's freedom of action, is rejected by the 
courts as class legislation, or as violating the freedom 
of contract. That is to say, the law is not allowed to 



170 LOOKING FORWARD 

interfere with the freedom of action in order to leave 
undisturbed the interference of conditions with the free- 
dom of action. An anomaly which necessarily must re- 
sult from the disharmony between legal theories and 
practical conditions. 

Of course, efforts are constantly made toward the 
adjustment of both, and numerous are the propositions 
to counteract the influence of wealth and the power of 
the ruling economic class. Some of them, have been 
practically tried, as for instance popular legislation by 
initiative and referendum and depreciation of money, the 
first being a purely political, the other a purely economic 
measure. The intitiative and the referendum prevail, 
although in a somewhat limited measure, in the Swiss 
republic. The institution may have its merits, but it 
seems to me that in the present economic order it can- 
not be made effective. In Switzerland, at least, where 
the general economic order and the relation between 
the classes are the same as in every other country with 
extensive industries, they have not resulted in any sub- 
stantial changes. Nor could they; for cause and effect 
cannot be reversed. The social question is not how to 
do things, but what to do. The mode of legislation is 
a means, not an end. Purely political measures maybe 
very effective against the power of political classes, but 
not of purely economic classes, and can therefore be of 
much importance only where political rights are not 
equal to all. There have of late been signs that the 
people of Switzerland are growing weary of the refer- 
endum. 

Depreciation of money, or more properly speaking, 
of coins, as well as the substitution of money-tokens for 
real money has, as history shows, been frequently re- 



THE STATE 171 

sorted to, and has sometimes been of benefit in tempo- 
rarily bridging over exceptional conditions, especially in 
times of war, as, for instance, during the American war 
for independence and the French revolution of 1798. 
But history does not record the fact that it ever had 
any lasting beneficial effect on the economic organiza- 
tion of society, or that it ever permanently bettered the 
condition of the class that needed betterment most. 
Although a purely economic measure, it does not seem 
to me to follow the trend of evolution and to be one 
that would by logical economic necessity come in course 
of time anyway. 

While these two measures have been practically 
tried, there are other propositions which have never had 
a practical test. There is the theory of the single tax, 
whose followers believe that an exclusive land-tax would 
bring about? a condition akin to public ownership of land 
and thereby revolutionize the entire economic system. 
Without intending to discuss extensively the merits or 
demerits of the theories of Henry George, I cannot sup- 
press a few thoughts in reference to it. It would be 
remarkable, indeed, if a simple fiscal measure, such as 
taxing only land and nothing else, no matter how high 
or low the tax-rate may be, should have the effect of 
completely revolutionizing the complete system of indus- 
try, commerce and finance of the present time. I do not 
believe that even Mr. George's brilliancy of style will 
ever convince the masses of the people that the power 
and influence of capital can be broken by freeing it from 
taxation. Presuming even, though I do not believe it, 
that the single tax would practically result in the aboli- 
tion of private ownership in land, leaving, as Mr. 
George puts it, only the shell to the owner and taking 



172 I.OOKING FORWARD 

from him the kernel, I am unable to see that such far- 
reaching changes in our economic conditions would 
thereby be produced, as Mr. George thinks there would. 
It requires the imaginative mind of Henry George to 
beheve that exploitation can be materially affected in 
the industrial and commercial world by any means 
which leaves the system of buying labor for its market 
price and producing and exchanging for profit intact. 

I do not recollect whether the word profit can be 
found at all in Mr. George's book, but I do know that 
in his theory profit is no special category of income. 
He still adheres to the ancient and musty theory of 
wages of superintendence, and treats profit as a species 
of wages, so that when he speaks of wages, he does not 
mean merely the price of hired labor, but also the profit 
of the merchant and manufacturer, the $100,000 or 
$150,000 salary of the president of a life insurance com- 
pany, the fee of a corporation lawyer; in fact, every- 
thing except interest and rent. An economic theory 
which fails to recognize profit as one of the pillars on 
which the prevailing system rests, and fails to distin- 
guish between the wages of the day laborer, the salary 
of a corporation president and the surplus of a mer- 
chant or manufacturer hardly deserves serious consider- 
ation. 

If at any time, anywhere, the conditions should be 
ripe for the abolition of private ownership in land, it will 
in all probability be done in a much more direct way 
than that of the single tax. 

Whether the doctrines of the so-called philosophic 
anarchists, who advocate the abolition of all authority, 
but have not yet been able to devise means for the con- 
duct of their own meetings without putting some kind 



THi; state; 173 

of authority into the hands of some person, are more 
worthy of attention, I will leave to those who are fami- 
liar with them. 

Municipal ownership, or, as it is called in Great 
Britain, municipal socialism, is sometimes recommended 
as a reform movement for the betterment of general 
economic conditions. Its effects in this respect are, 
however, overestimated. It has been in practice in Ger- 
many for many years without any visible effect on gen- 
eral economic conditions. Municipal socialism is a mis- 
nomer, for it is at the present time not socialistic, neither 
in inception nor purpose, but merely a business method. 
The character of municipal or state ownership depends 
altogether on the character of the state and its ruling 
class, and this is in present times anything but social- 
istic. As a business method it may have many advan- 
tages, as a general reform movement it is of little value. 

The most radical, and, at the same time, the most 
rational movement, is unquestionably modern socialism, 
based upon the theories of Karl Marx, who, with his 
acute, critical mind, has produced a description of mod- 
ern economic conditions and relations, the analytical 
force of which has not been surpassed by anything that 
has been written on the subject before or since. Marx 
distinguishes between labor force and labor, the latter 
being the result of the application of the former. What 
the employer buys is labor force and what he pays for 
it is, if the laborer is not to suffer actual want, what, 
considering the standard of living and the necessity of 
maintaining a family for the preservation of the class, 
is necessary for the reproduction of the labor force 
expended. As this requires an amount of labor far 
below the amount actually performed, the laborer pro- 



174 I.OOKING FORWARD 

duces surplus values which become the property of the 
employer and are accumulated for the formation of 
wealth and capital. In other words, wealth is composed 
of the difference between the price of labor force and 
the result of labor performed. A man's labor force is a 
physical quantity which does not change much; but 
labor itself, the form in which labor force is applied, is 
subject to variation in kind and effectiveness and has 
grown in productiveness with the perfection of the in- 
struments of labor. 

These, however, the laborer does not possess. With- 
out them he cannot make use of his labor force. He is, 
therefore, compelled to sell his labor force to the owner 
of the instruments of labor at a price which is influenced 
comparatively little by the normal result of its applica- 
tion. 

Modern socialism, therefore, advocates the national- 
ization or socialization of production by abolishing pri- 
vate ownership of the instruments of production. This 
would necessarily result in the abolition of the wage sys- 
tem and lead to a distribution of the products among 
the producers, after having made provision for the needs 
of government, the aged, the sick and other dependents 
and those who in science or art perform beneficial, 
though not materially or physically productive, labor. 

It is part of the socialistic philosophy that, by an 
unavoidable process of evolution, socialism will become 
the basis of the economic structure of society, as certain 
as individualism is its basis now. The transformation 
will, according to that philosophy, be gradual, although 
it is possible that great upheavals and revolutions will 
be a part of the evolutionary process. Believing that 
the working class must create its own freedom and fur- 



the; statib; 175 

ther believing the attainment of political power for th<^ 
accomplishment of their purposes to be a condition sine 
qua non, socialists everywhere effect political organiza- 
tions, using the ballot as a means of accomplishing their 
object. The socialistic movement has become world- 
wide, and there is hardly any civilized country in which 
it is without organization. It has a very extensive lit- 
erature and a large number of newspapers and periodi- 
cals. Very fanciful pictures of socialistic conditions 
have been drawn by Edward Bellamy in his "Looking 
Backward," and by William Morris in his ''News From 
Nowhere." While scientists, politicians and statesmen 
advocating sociaUsm are careful to refrain from pic- 
torial descriptions of future conditions, and confine 
themselves to statements and explications of theories, it 
is, of course, the privilege of the novelist and the poet 
to be descriptive and fanciful. 

A not inconsiderable faction of the Socialists under 
the leadership of Jaures in France and Bernstein in Ger- 
many, impressed by the uncertainty of the future, attach 
more importance to the movement itself than to the the- 
ories and probabilities of its final outcome, considering 
the latter of secondary value only. 

Perhaps it may be of interest to the reader to learn 
the opinions of two such eminent American scholars as 
the Reverend Dr. Lyman Abbott, one of the foremost 
pulpit orators of America, and Mr. Lewis H. Morgan, 
the great scientist whom I have so frequently mentioned 
in this book. Mr. Abbott in a lecture on ''Industrial 
Evolution," which I attended a number of years ago, 
expressed himself about as follows: "The first condi- 
tion of labor is slavery. The capitalist, in this stage, 
owns the laborer, and, therefore, owns all the products 



176 I.OOKING FORWARD 

of the labor. The second condition is feudalism, in 
which system the capitalist owns the land and the laborer 
is an attachment to the land. The capitalist, in other 
words, has a lien on the laborer. The third stage in the 
evolution is the present wage system. The capitalist 
now owns the tools, and the laborer, having no tools of 
his own, must needs work at the command of the cap- 
italist owner of the tools. Personally, however, the 
laborer is free. The wages system, or capitalist system, 
is a gain over feudalism, as feudalism is a gain over 
slavery. To-day is better than yesterday, but may not 
to-morrow be better than to-day? The remedy will lie 
in the establishment of a ''democracy'' of industry, which 
will be the fourth stage of evolution, toward which we 
are rapidly tending. The men who toil shall own the 
tools in this new era. The evolution of government 
corresponds with the evolution of industry. Through 
the paternal stage, we are now in the individualistic, and 
are tending toward the fraternal." 

Mr. Morgan closes one of the chapters in his 
^'Ancient Society'' with the following words : ''Since the 
advent of civilization the outgrowth of property has 
been so immense, its forms so diversified, its uses so 
expanding and its management so intelligent in the in- 
terests of its owners, that it has become on the part of 
the people, an unmanageable power. The human mind 
stands bewildered in the presence of its own creation. 
The time will come, nevertheless, when human intelli- 
gence will rise to the mastery over property, and define 
the relations of the state to the property it protects, as 
well as the obligations and the limtis of the rights of its 
owners. The interests of society are paramount to in- 
dividual interests, and the two must be brought into just 



the: state; 177 

and harmonious relation. A mere property career is not 
the final destiny of mankind, if progress is to be the 
law of the future as it has been of the past. The time 
which has passed away since civilization began is but a 
fragment of the past duration of man's existence, and 
but a fragment of the ages yet to come. The dissolu- 
tion of society bids fair to become the termination of a 
career of which property is the end and aim, because 
such a career contains the elements of self-destruction. 
Democracy of government, brotherhood in society, 
equality in rights and privileges, and universal educa- 
tion, foreshadow the next higher plane of society to 
which experience, intelligence and knowledge are stead- 
ily tending. It will be a revival, in a higher form, of 
the liberty, equality and fraternity of the ancient gen- 
tes.'' 

What I want to make clear is the point that political 
and social institutions are the results of economic insti- 
tutions, or more particularly, the results of the prevalent 
general modes of production and the economic struct- 
ures created by them at different times, and that, there- 
fore, the principal point of attack for reform movements 
must be the economic institutions. The means of attack 
may be of a political character, but the aim must be of 
an economic nature. And in order not to be misunder- 
stood, I will add that under economic institutions I do 
not understand individual enterprises, or any number of 
them, but that which is part of, or equivalent to, a sys- 
tem, as, for instance, the institution of working for 
wages, or the institution of selling for profit, etc. 

Although the evolutionary force in society is contin- 
ually active, and never for a moment ceases to be, yet 
man is its instrument, and social movement its form of 



178 I.OOKING FORWARD 

action. We cannot quietly wait until changes come by 
themselves. They have to be made by man. The social 
edifice has been erected by man. Judging from the his- 
tory of the past, it seems to be one of the most difficult 
tasks of man to understand and clearly see the trend of 
evolution in his own time. Whether men are blinded by 
ignorance or selfishness, I care not to investigate, but it 
almost seems to me to be the tragic fate of human soci- 
ety that it must take up or,, at leasty consider every erro- 
neous, nay even impossible, proposition, and give a 
practical test to many of them, before adopting a meas- 
ure of real curative force. It seems to me also, judg- 
ing from history, that society is not able to leap from 
one extreme into the other, and that there must always 
be middle or transition periods. So it is quite probable 
that the constantly proceeding concentration of capital, 
industry and commerce, the formation of trusts, syndi- 
cates and other economic associations for the purpose 
of avoiding competition, the clearly visible tendency in 
the development of our economics to eliminate competi- 
tion, are signs of a period of transition from the system 
of competition to some other system, the exact outlines 
of which have not yet appeared. B'e that as it may, the 
world will not stand still, and those who are young 
' enough may, perhaps, be witnesses of remarkable 
changes in the not very distant future. Of whatever 
nature these changes may be, of one thing we may be 
sure : The world will never go backward ; it will never 
give up any of the cultural achievements of the past, 
but will increase them rather and build on them. It 
will never give up any of the acquired facilities of pro- 
duction, and never lower the general standard of life. 
A new system which will stand on a higher plane 



THE state: 179 

than the present will gradually grow and augment man's 
comfort, happiness and freedom. It is difficult, if not 
impossible, to imagine any form of government which 
could be better adapted to our economic system of profit 
and wages than the state as constituted at present. It 
is, indeed, so well adapted to it, it is so closely linked to 
it, that it is unable to battle successfully with its evils. 
No personal ties, no personal relations are recognized 
in the aflfairs of government and the economic life of the 
people. The only relation in which man stands to the 
state is that of either citizen or subject. Economically 
speaking, everybody is left to himself, and the weaker 
to the mercy of the stronger. Freedom of will is, by 
legislation and in the administration of justice presup- 
posed, but as a matter of fact does not exist. Violence 
and deceit are the only forces recognized as being able 
to afifect the freedom of contract ; human feeling, human 
aflfection, physical sufifering, needs, wants, habits and 
passions are forces unknown to the law of contract, be- 
cause they are of an emotional and intellectual character^ 
and therefore intangible. The government of the mod- 
ern state takes the attitude of the umpire at a prize fight, 
insisting on fair play between the fighters and strict ob- 
servation of the rules of fighting. The freedom of cap- 
ital is almost perfect. 

Such a form of government, be it monarchical or 
republican, does not appeal to the highest and noblest 
sentiments of which man is capable. It almost seems 
that the modern republic has progressed more rapidly 
in the elimination of all relations between the person and 
the government than the modern monarchy. For, what 
we like to call paternalism : rules and regulations fre- 
quently of a petty nature, which seem to us vexatious, 



180 BOOKING FORWARD 

usually flow from a desire to check the individuars reck- 
less disregard of the interests, feelings and sentiments of 
others. 

There are already strong indications everywhere of 
the gradual abandonment of the doctrine of laisser faire. 
The principle of non-interference of the state in eco- 
nomic matters is quite frequently violated and can hard- 
ly be maintained very much longer. In European coun- 
tries, especially in Germany, laws in reference to fair 
competition, hours of labor, the condition of working 
places and factories, state insurance of laborers against 
old age, sickness and accident are enforced without con- 
stitutional scruples. In the United States efforts in that 
direction are repeatedly made. So far, however, most 
legislation of this kind has been declared unconstitu- 
tional. Yet the Supreme Court of Montana recently de- 
clared constitutional a law making the eight-hour work- 
day compulsory for mines, and Colorado amended its 
constitution to make possible the enactment of such a 
law; but efforts toward its enactment have so far failed. 
At all events it seems to me that the tendency toward 
abandoning the doctrine of non-interference and the let- 
alone policy is growing in strength, which means that 
there is a tendency toward forcing the state to pay more 
attention to personal relations and individual conditions 
than heretofore. If this tendency should become pow- 
erful, it must, in course of time, materially affect the 
functions of the state and its relation to the citizens. 

From its inception to this day, the state has been, 
and still is, a class-institution. It could not and cannot 
be anything else. It owes its creation to the existence 
of classes, it will last as long as classes exist and will 
disappear whenever they cease to exist. Even Plato and 



THE STATE 181 

Aristoteles, who lived and wrote only a little more than 
two centuries after the advent of state-government in 
Greece, were unable to conceive of the possibility of civ- 
ilized existence without the state, and equally unable to 
conceive of a state without classes. All recollections of 
the great powder of the gentile organization seem to have 
had vanished. In the opinions of these great thinkers 
man could exist only in and through the state ; to them 
the highest moral duty of man was to serve the state. 
Aristoteles was even unable to imagine a state without 
slaves, whose moral duty and greatest virtue was to obey. 
The class has been the result of a productive power 
which, although originally small, furnished more than 
what was absolutely needed for subsistence. When labor 
commenced to furnish a surplus over what was neces- 
sary for the worker's subsistence, society divided itself 
into classes, one of which did all the work, while the 
other lived on its surplus. The necessity of class-insti- 
tutions, and the state as the only possible embodiment of 
social order, were defended by statesmen and philoso- 
phers from the time of Plato up to the twentieth cen- 
tury. But while the ancients had good grounds for their 
philosophy, none exist in modern times. The product- 
ive power of their society was small ; that of ours is im- 
mense. It is, perhaps, quite true that, as Buckle argues, 
civilization would have been impossible without the ex- 
istence of unproductive classes, and that when produc- 
tion is so small that everybody has to employ almost all 
his time in the production of the necessities of life, an 
intellectual class can only exist, if it is permitted to live 
on the surplus produced by others. But it is needless 
to explain that that reasoning is not applicable to our era 



182 LOOKING FORWARD 

of unlimited power of production ; and then — intellectual 
and unproductive are not necessarily the same. 

The class, and with it the state, owe the possibility 
of their creation to the comparative poverty of society 
at the time of their creation. They are unseparable and 
have become incorisistent with the condition of wealth 
into which society has grown. Sooner or later they will 
both disappear. They will be abolished, not from a sim- 
ple conviction that their existence is contrary to justice 
and equality, or from any other ethical reason, nor from 
the simple desire to abolish them, but by the force of 
economic conditions. 

Naturally the question will be asked: What will 
take their place ? Morgan, that most eminent and close 
observer of human and social progress, and wise inter- 
preter of ancient institutions, thinks that there will be a 
revival in higher form of the ancient gentes. Maybe he 
is right. Maybe some new and happier form may be 
found. We can never be positively certain about the 
future. But be this as it may, we may be sure that 
society will find a form of order and government com- 
patible with a general enjoyment of its immense wealth, 
compatible with a more universally beneficial use of its 
unlimited productive force and compatible with its con- 
stantly growing democratical sentiment. 

The exact outlines of this form are, I repeat, not 
distinctly visible yet. And although it is quite appar- 
ent that it will be the result of continuous social and 
economic struggles, which in their nature are class 
struggles, it cannot even be predicted with any degree of 
certainty what forms these struggles may yet assume. 
We can only hope and wish that modern parliamenta- 



THE STATE 183 

rism may be able to reduce violent and convulsive 
movements to a minimum. That it cannot prevent them 
altogether, we have had ample proof. For there is one 
class that has little, if anything, to lose and everything 
to gain, and another that has far more to lose than to 
gain in the settlement of the great social conflicts. So 
far very little, if any, ability has manifested itself to set- 
tle the conflict between justice and evolution on one side 
and personal or class interest on the other with intelli- 
gence and good will and in a spirit of love and kindness. 
The indications rather point to the contrary. 

- The world, as it is, is governed by motives of selfish- 
ness, not from choice, nor from natural inclination, but 
from force of conditions. The individual, however char- 
itably and philanthropically inclined, is powerless to 
direct the course of class-movements in opposition to 
the interests of the class. Upon the other hand, there 
are many instances of cruelty and tyranny of men, nat- 
urally kind and humane, but actuated by certain con- 
ceptions of right and wrong and firmly believing in the 
justice, righteousness and necessity of their course. I 
do not know of any instance in the history of the human 
race where any concessions in the direction of greater 
rights or greater freedom of the masses have volun- 
tarily been granted by the rulers to the ruled, although 
not infrequently concessions made some time after the 
defeat of revolutionary movements had the appearance 
of being voluntary. During the whole course of human 
history there was no establishment of liberty, or greater 
rights of the lower classes, or better conditions of the 
masses, except as the result of never-resting class strug- 
gles. In asserting this, the wish is not father of the 



184 IvOOKING FORWARD 

thought; for I greatly wish that It were different. But 
history is history, and we must take the facts as it rec- 
ords them. 

Much has been accompHshed toward the settlement 
of modern social conflicts in a manner free from phys- 
ical violence in Australia and New Zealand by the or- 
ganization of labor parties and the use of parliamentary 
methods. To some extent this looks encouraging. But 
it should not be overlooked that those countries, com- 
pared with America and Europe are industrially poorly 
developed and that most of their population is concen^ 
trated in cities. The socialistic tendency of their legis- 
lation is easily recognizable, but what it will lead to in 
the end cannot yet be seen. 

However, speaking generally, the fact that the forms 
of the future economic structure and political govern- 
ment can only be surmised but not definitely predicted, 
need not be a matter of grave concern. We may safely 
act on probabilities, and no harm can come from treat- 
ing as positive what, as long as man has only human 
powers, can, at best, be only probable. The thinker and 
student requires not more than a scientifically deduced 
probability. The masses, however, need definite hope, 
a definite goal, a definite ideal. The higher that ideal, 
the nobler and loftier the sentiments created by it. The 
masses need an aim, an object, true enough to appeal 
to their intellect, beautiful enough to appeal to their 
longings and great enough to satisfy their yearnings for 
a complete enjoyment of the gifts of nature and the 
blessings of culture and civilization. Where such an 
ideal is wanting, or where no attempts are made tovar-^ 
its realization and tiie struggle tor Detter condalons is 



THE STATE 185 

confined merely to present possibilities, violent outbreaks 
are almost unavoidable. Political economy, as officially 
taught, contains nothing that is apt to create such an 
ideal, and its few sentimental generalities are more a 
sign of utter hopelessness and helplessness than of hope. 



VII. 

The Modern Economic System. 

It is said of the tutor of king Giistavus Adolphus of 
Sweden, the celebrated chancellor Oxenstierna, that he 
once said to his pupil : ''My son, you have no idea with 
how little good sense and reason the world is governed." 
Indeed, it seems that the world is oftener governed by 
follies and absurdities than by wise and prudent meas- 
ures. But I believe that the world cannot always be 
governed by follies, absurdities and inconsistencies, cer- 
tainly not by the same ones. 

As far as economics are concerned, absurdities and 
inconsistencies arise by development. That is to say, 
institutions which, in their beginning, appear quite sen- 
sible, nay, even necessary, breed in course of time ab- 
surdities by unforeseen and unintended effects. When- 
ever these absurdities appear, it is a sure sign that the 
prevailing economic system is reaching its climax, that 
it has become inconsistent with the best interests of soci- 
ety, and that the end of its career is approaching. I 
think, therefore, that a statement of some of the absurd- 
ities, inconsistencies and peculiarities of the modern eco- 
nomic system will be quite instructive. 

This system is, in one sense, based upon the princi- 
ple of freedom of contract. But in giving effect to this 
principle, freedom is considered from a political and not 
from an economic standpoint, although most contracts 
are of an economic character. The contract of a minor, 

186 



THE MODERN ECONOMIC SYSTEM 187 

for instance, be he ever so intelligent, is invalid, but the 
contract of a hungry man is valid. A man contracting 
under threats of violence is considered to act under 
duress, but the man who accepts a very dangerous, or 
very loathsome, or very ill-paying employment, because 
of his fear that he may find no other employment, and 
would be in danger of starving, if he refused it, is con- 
sidered in law a free agent. Considering the condition 
of the average employee, it is quite clear that his freedom 
of contract is nothing but a legal fiction. Yet, it is upon 
this legal fiction that courts have repeatedly set aside as 
unconstitutional legislative enactments for the abolition 
of certain abuses in the treatment of workingmen, as for 
instance the truck system. The law, based upon, or 
rather being the fruit of, our economic system, presup- 
poses a freedom of will, where there is no freedom of 
choice — a palpable impossibility. Or it assumes the free" 
dom of choice on the part of the working classes — a pal- 
pable error. 

The inability of our jurists to distinguish between 
man as a citizen, that is, as a political being, and man 
as an individual, that is, as a natural being, has led to 
another anomaly, namely, the legal fiction of equality. 
Ignoring economic inequalities, and accepting political 
equality as an existing fact, they insist upon legislation 
which aflfects all classes equally. This, however, is 
impossible. If the legislator legislates in favor of the 
laborer by limiting the hours of labor, or prescribing 
certain rules of payment of wages, the courts, under the 
fiction of civil equality and protection of the rights of 
contract and property, declare such laws to be class-leg- 
islation and, therefore, unconstitutional. 

Obviously, only such legislation is judicially declared 



188 I.OOKING FORWARD 

to be class-legislation which affects the interests of the 
ruling class unfavorably. Laws rendering illegal con- 
tracts for the payment of wages in anything else but 
money, or in longer than certain periods, have been de- 
clared unconstitutional as class-legislation and because 
they rob the laborer of his freedom to contract as he 
pleases for the sale of his labor, which is his property. 
Does this principle not apply to the money lender as well 
as to the laborer ? Do usury laws not violate the freedom 
of contract ? Why is the money lender's freedom of con- 
tract not protected? Simply because usury laws — which 
now have the sanctity of age — are of feudal origin and 
served to protect the ruling class. 

But how can theories of property be applied to labor 
force ? By another fiction : the fiction that labor is prop- 
erty, for the sale of which the laborer who sells it must 
be as free to contract as for the sale of any other prop- 
erty. But labor-force lacks all the elements of property. 
The seller cannot divest himself, nor be dispossessed of 
it, without either suicide or homicide. It exists and dies 
with the laborer himself. What property rights could 
the purchaser of labor assert, if he should pay for it in 
advance and the seller should refuse to work? Labor 
cannot be replevied, it cannot be taken on execution, it 
cannot be attached, it does not go into the hands of the 
administrator, nor descends to heirs. It is inseparable 
from man, it is man himself. Labor can only be prop- 
erty, if the laborer himself is property. Consequently 
only slave labor can be property, but not wage labor. 

Thus to prevent legislation favorable to the laborer, 
courts pretend to protect the laborer's fictitious liberty 
and protect it by impregnating wage labor with the 
characteristics of slave labor. 



THE MODERN ECONOMIC SYSTEM 189 

Can anything be more absurd? 

Legal fictions have, taken the place of class-privileges 
of former times and they preserve economic inequality 
with equal effect. Theoretically, that is politically, we 
all have the same right to become rich, but how could 
the wage system be maintained without a poor class? 
In practice, the conditions are those of a lottery, in 
which everyone taking a chance may win, but in which 
the gains of the winners are made up of the losses of 
the losers. 

There is a conflict between theory and practice. 
Economic conditions make the exercise of political free- 
dom and equality, principally in matters of contract, im- 
possible to a certain class of citizens. Whether a right 
does not exist, or cannot practically be used, the effect 
is the same. But how do our jurists get out of the 
dilemma ? By the fiction that, if one does what he would 
prefer not to do, were he not by circumstances com- 
pelled to do it, his action is nevertheless that of his own 
free will. They insist upon the existence of equality 
and the absence of classes, because the law grants no 
privileges. 

It is one of the characteristics of our economic sys- 
tem that, working only through the effect of conditions 
and not through express legal enactments, its modus 
operandi is so difficult to understand. The relations of 
the slave to his master and of the serf to his lord, are so 
simple and transparent that their effect can be compre- 
hended without trouble. The relation of the wage- 
worker, however, who apparently receives for his work 
all that it seems to be worth, and yet remains poor, while 
the purchaser of his labor is in a condition to grow rich 
and frequently does grow rich, is quite a complicated 



190 I.OOKING FORWARD 

matter which requires a great deal of study for its 
understanding. Hence the difficulty of comprehending 
the source of the capitalist's power and the slowness of 
movements for economic reforms. 

References to such movements are frequently brushed 
aside with a wave of the hand and the careless remark 
that there have been always rich and poor, and that there 
always will be such. Of course, it' is unnecessary to say 
that the fact that a thing was, is no proof that it will be. 
The poverty of the laborer of former periods was the 
direct result of the force of law and only the indirect 
result of the force of conditions, while his poverty at 
present is the direct result of the force of conditions 
and only the indirect result of the force of law. 

Wealth is created by production. This requires no 
explanation. But the distribution of wealth is not regu- 
lated by production but by the manipulation of the pro- 
ducts, which in itself creates nothing. If I have lumber 
of the value of five dollars and make out of that lum- 
ber a table worth twenty dollars, I have by my labor 
produced a value of fifteen dollars. The general stock 
of products, the wealth existing, has been increased by 
so much. Now, if somebody gives me twenty dollars 
for the table and afterwards sells it for twenty-five dol- 
lars, no new wealth has been produced by that process; 
there are neither more tables in the world, nor more 
money; yet somebody has five dollars more than he had 
before. The table may be sold a second time and bring 
thirty dollars, and again somebody has five dollars more 
than he had before, although there are neither more 
tables nor more money in the world. Of course, I know 
that a pseudo science explains that value is added to the 
table by bringing it nearer to the consumer, but this is 



THE MODERN ECONOMIC SYSTEM 191 

merely an excuse for a system which adds to price with- 
out adding to value and confounds both. The table is 
always the same table, and no number of sales can elim- 
inate the fact that exchange creates nothing and that 
only production creates wealth. Yet, a large class of 
people grow wealthy merely by exchange, and it is the 
special characteristic of modern industry that it pro- 
duces merely for the purpose of exchange. The earliest 
mode of production was home production coupled with 
home consumption; slaves and serfs produced what was 
immediately consumed at home. Later on, the immedi- 
ate object of production was consumption by somebody 
else but the producer; if I needed a coat, I went to the 
tailor and had one made; if I needed a pair of shoes, 
the cobbler made them for me, and I wore them ; but the 
object of modern production is exchange, or as it is 
called, trade and commerce. Between the producer and 
the consumer there is a great distance; they do not 
know each other, they do not see each other. Between 
them is the manipulator of the product. The products 
are merchandise before they become articles of consump- 
tion. The result of this special characteristic of mod- 
ern production is overproduction where there is want, 
and overpopulation where there is a natural possibility 
of supporting a much larger population. 

The extent of the United States, the general re- 
sources and the natural wealth of the country could 
probably support a population ten or more times as 
large as it is now. Comparing the population of the 
United States with that of Europe, in respect of den- 
sity, this assertion is perfectly justified. Yet the physi- 
cian complains that there are too many physicians, the 
lawyer that there are too many lawyers, the merchant 



192 I.OOKING FORWARD 

that there are too many merchants, the laborer that there 
ar too many laborers, and so forth. It seems as if there 
were too many everywhere, and as if the absurd Malthu- 
sian theory that the earth cannot produce enough for its 
growing population were actually true. And that in an 
age in which the productive power of man exceeds many 
times his power of consumption! Upon the other hand, 
the population of Ireland has within not much more than 
a hundred years declined about one-half without improv- 
ing the situation and making an end of the seeming con- 
dition of overpopulation. 

There is scarcely a branch of industry in which from 
time to time a condition of the market does not appear 
which is ascribed to overproduction. Has there been a 
change in the natural condition of men? Do they eat 
less, do they drink less, do they wear less? Has their 
natural power of consumption decreased? Not at all. 
Overproduction has no reference whatever either to the 
number of human beings in existence, nor to their needs 
or their natural power of consumption; it has reference 
only to an artificially created condition, in which people 
have not the means wherewith to buy what they need. 
The natural power of consumption has remained the 
same, but the economic power of consumption is not the 
same. Both are so diflferent from each other that there 
may be a condition of overproduction in a thing of which 
millions are sorely in need and suffer for the want of it. 

Considered in the abstract, such a condition is absurd. 
In former periods overproduction would have been the 
source of joy; it would have meant luxury, plentiful- 
ness. In our times it is the source of want and misery. 
If, speaking in the language of the religiously ortho- 
dox, God should take it in his mind to punish the wheat- 



the; mode;rn e:conomic system 193 

growers of Russia, Hungary and Argentina by letting it 
rain too much, and curtailing their portion of sunshine, 
blessing at the same time the American farmers with 
enormous crops, the latter will kneel in prayer and thank 
God for his great kindness. But if God should be equally 
kind to all the wheat-growers of the world, the Amer- 
ican farmer, instead of thanking God for his kindness, 
will raise the cry of ruin and advocate the free coinage 
of silver. Of course, two hundred bushels of wheat go 
in their feeding capacity just twice as far as one hun- 
dred bushels, and represent twice as much actual wealth, 
but the farmer does not consider actual wealth, but 
wealth as expressed in dollars and cents; to him wheat 
is not an article of consumption, but an article of trade, 
and over-abundant crops may result in such a falling of 
the price that they make him actually poorer. His wheat 
is growing on the field, but his wealth is made on that 
mysterious thing which is called the market. Absurd as 
it sounds, it is nevertheless true, that in modern indus- 
try it is practically sought to create wealth by restrain- 
ing its production. For the producer produces what he 
does not need or use for himself, and his product is only 
of value to him in proportion as it brings him dollars 
and cents. So it comes that our industrial system re- 
sults in underproduction compared with the natural 
power of consumption, and in overproduction, compared 
with the economic power of consumption, all of which 
is a poverty and misery creating absurd condition, most 
detrimental to the welfare of the masses of the people. 
Everybody is aware of the wonderful growth of the 
power of production in modern times. It is so stupen- 
dous that it baffles description. In some instances pro- 
duction by machinery is more than a hundred times as 



194 tOOKING FORWARD 

effective as production by hand. The productive power 
of our generation is practically unlimited. I cannot but 
think that if there were in existence an individual en- 
dowed with authority of directing all production and 
distribution, and being perfectly just to all, he would see 
to it that there is enough produced of everything, and 
that it is distributed so, that every person could live in 
comfort. As far as our productive power is concerned, 
that would be perfectly possible without being stingy in 
the allotment of time for leisure and recreation. I can- 
not help thinking that if the economic affairs of the 
world were directed by one will, guided by reason and 
justice, the wonderful growth of the power of produc- 
tion by the invention of mechanical contrivances would 
have resulted in less labor and more comfort for each 
and would have become a blessing for all mankind, ele- 
vating them physically, morally and intellectually. In- 
stead of this, what do we behold? 

First, that the hours of labor are as long, or nearly 
as long, as they were before the invention of machinery, 
John Stuart Mill says somewhere that he doubts that 
by the invention of machinery a single hour of labor was 
saved to anyone. 

Secondly, that we have among us probably as many 
paupers as the world ever had, and that among the 
masses of the people there is perhaps as much want and 
misery as there ever was. 

There is no doubt but that workingmen to-day enjoy 
many comforts which were not within their reach a cen- 
tury and more ago, but food, clothing and shelter were 
as necessary to them then as they are now. Yet with a 
productive power infinitely small compared with that of 
the present generation, without the aid of almost any 



TH]S mode:rn economic system 195 

machinery, the working classes produced not only the 
necessaries of life for themselves, but also for those who 
produced nothing. They produced, as they do to-day, 
all articles of luxury for the rich and the privileged 
classes; they built their palaces, wove their velvets and 
silks, carved their costly furniture and erected churches 
and other public edifices of remarkable beauty and grand- 
eur. Reasoning backward, from the fact that in spite 
of our enormous power of production, we do not pro- 
duce enough for the comfort of all, we are almost un- 
able to understand how that was possible, and how pro- 
duction at that time did not fall far short of the imme- 
diate wants of the people. If sumptuary laws would not 
prove the contrary, one would feel inclined to believe 
that poverty, want and misery were the lot of almost the 
whole working population. But such was not the case, 
and if we could believe in the truth of all the romantic 
stories of former times, human happiness was rather 
more general than it is now. Be that, however, as it 
may, it is positively certain that the comfort and the wel- 
fare of the masses have grown in infinitely smaller pro- 
portions than the power of production. 

If, prior to the age of machinery, it was possible for 
every worker to produce by mere handicraft a surplus 
over and above the necessaries of life for himself and his 
family, we can form some judgment as to how large that 
surplus must be to-day without going into intricate cal- 
culations. 

I do not care to examine carefully and in detail the 
causes which make necessary the production of such an 
enormous surplus; that would require a complete analy- 
sis of our economic system; but it would be a mistake 
to believe that it all goes into the pockets of the factory- 



196 I^OOIQNI^ FORWARD 

owners, although much of it travels that way. The 
larger part of it, I believe, must serve to support a 
numerous non-productive class which appeared in the 
wake of competition and manufacturing for the purpose 
of trade. I have reference to the immense number of 
middlemen and go-betweens, to all those who do not 
sell their own goods or the products of their own estab- 
lishments. Only a few hundred years ago, when me- 
chanics and artisans simply executed the orders of their 
consuming customers, and commerce was small and of 
modest extent, there was in the economic world very 
little, if any, room for traders, agents, drummers, bro- 
kers, commissioners, solicitors and so forth, all of whom 
consume necessaries of life without producing any. 

It is a queer world in which we live. In our younger 
years, when our senses are strong and vigorous, when 
our souls yearn for the enjoyment of life, and our hearts 
are receptive of all that nature and civilization offers, 
we must forego many comforts and pleasures and sup- 
press many desires, because life, health and economic 
existence are equally uncertain, and we must, if such is 
possible, lay by, economize, save. If we are fortunate 
and succeed, and are, as the years go by, able to accumu- 
late a competence, we grow old in the meantime, and 
lose the physical and mental vigor to fully enjoy life. 
Our economic and social arrangements rob the majority 
of the civilized human beings of a full realization of the 
pleasures of life in the age which alone permits their 
full realization, and later, in the age in which it would 
be economically possible, nature forbids it. As far as 
individual happiness is concerned, it is a question whether 
the tramp who looks with contempt on all that civiliza- 
tion offers is not happier than the decent and respectable 



THE MODERN ECONOMIC SYSTEM 197 

member of society, and whether civilization has increased 
the amount of happiness in the world. Fortunately, we 
have good reasons to believe in the progressive power of 
civilization, leading to a different and better future. 

When the young man enters the business world and 
commences his career, he is admonished to save. From 
the standpoint of private economy, the advice is certainly 
good, but from a politico-economic standpoint it is sim- 
ply nonsense. Can anything be saved? Is not every- 
thing in the world, no matter how lasting it is, destroyed 
in the end, if not by use, then by the ravages of nature? 
To save is an entirely negative proposition. If I save 
the money for a pair of shoes, it does not mean that I 
save five dollars from destruction, because the five dol- 
lars which I would expend for the shoes would still con- 
tinue their existence, but it means the nonproduction 
of a pair of shoes. Nothing is saved in reality, but pro- 
duction is restrained. While it is commonly believed 
that saving creates wealth, as a matter of fact, it pre- 
vents the creation of wealth. Accumulation of wealth 
and production of wealth are two different things; the 
latter is possible without the former, but the former is 
not possible without the latter. Our economic system 
has produced such a remarkable conflict between private 
economy and political economy that the individual can 
almost do nothing to benefit himself without injury to 
the body poHtic. 

Defenders of our economic system not unfrequently 
advance the theory of the survival of the fittest. The 
theory is not as modest as that of the theologian who 
believes that God has put everyone into his proper place, 
but as applied it is just as comfortable and convenient. 
Since the appearance of Darwin's epoch-making book on 



198 LOOKING FORWARD 

"The Origin of Species," the words evolution and sur- 
vival of the fittest are in everybody's mouth, but by no 
means fully understood by everybody. There is cer- 
tainly a great difference between the struggle for exist- 
ence in nature and the struggle for existence in society, 
and it is, to say the least, an unsettled question whether 
the theory of the survival of the fittest is equally applica- 
ble to both. Granted, however, for argument's sake, 
that it is, and that economic success is the measure of 
fitness, what would follow? That the fittest in human 
society is the one who can make the most money, the 
one who possesses, in the highest degree, those faculties 
which make possible the accumulation of a fortune. We 
would be forced to conclude that the man is so much 
fitter as a social being as he can gather wealth, and that, 
as things are going under our economic arrangements, 
and not to speak of men of letters, science or art, the 
man who can make a table out of raw wood is less fit, 
and, consequently, a less useful member of society, than 
the one who can sell it with a profit. Yet, I must con- 
fess that I am of the opinion that if those who have the 
particular faculty of selling tables at a profit should not 
survive, one might have tables nevertheless; but if those 
who can make tables should fail to survive, I am at a 
loss to see how we should get them. 

According to the Darwinian theory, faculties, char- 
acteristics, talents and aptitudes grow in strength by 
their use in the struggle for existence. If we reflect for 
a moment what particular qualifications and proficiencies 
are necessary for making money, how seldom it is that 
men of great minds and genius, students and men of 
great learning succeed in making money, how much bet- 
ter the chances of the reckless and inconsiderate are 



THE MODERN ECONOMIC SYSTEM 199 

than those of the careful, timid and noble-minded, it 
would be, indeed, quite a peculiar kind of society in 
which the money-making persons are the fittest and will 
therefore survive the others. 

It is very often asserted that genius and talent will 
always succeed in the end, even if they have to overcome 
many obstacles. This is said without much knowledge 
and thought. The fact that genius and talent succeed 
in some cases under adverse conditions is no proof that 
they succeed in all cases. The world does not mention 
those who fail under adverse conditions, and history 
learns not of them. If it were not so, we would prob- 
ably have knowledge of m_ore geniuses and more talents. 
Genius and talent are natural gifts, and nature is lavish. 
More than ten generations have come and gone since the 
birth of Shakespeare. Averaging each generation at 
fifty millions of English speaking people, more than five 
hundred millions have come into the world and gone 
from it since that time. I do not and cannot believe 
that nature, so profuse in its creations, should have cre- 
ated the genius of a Shakespeare only once among five 
hundred millions of human beings, not to speak of those 
who lived before Shakespeare, nor those who will live 
after us. I am far more inclined to believe that nature 
has created many Shakespeares but that economic and 
social conditions did not allow them to grow and develop. 

Has any one ever been able to count those geniuses 
and talents that went under in the struggle for daily 
bread, those who had to give up their ideals and sacri- 
fice their ambitions, because they first needed a liveli- 
hood? Has any one ever been able to count those chil- 
dren born in poverty, but gifted by nature with genius 
or talent, and never receiving the education necessary for 



aOO I.OOKING FORWARD 

its development, either because the parents on account of 
their poverty could not afford it, or in their ignorance, 
generally also the result of poverty, were unable to dis- 
cover genius or talent? Genius and talent need free- 
dom from, care for their development. Even those gifted 
with an inventive genius succeed only if the result of 
their genius can be readily transformed into money by 
capitalists, and even then it is generally the capitalist who 
gets the lion's share. 

Privileged classes and their governments have al- 
ways taken pride in fostering and protecting arts and 
science, and have given many a chance to the develop- 
ment of discovered geniuses or talents. But ^^noblesse'' 
does not ^'oblige'' the economic class pure and simple. 
It leaves everything to private or business enterprise. 
The richest government in the world, that of the United 
States, haSi not to this day thought of establishing an in- 
stitution like the universities of Germany where men of 
science are given the opportunity of free research. The 
average American university professor is still not more 
than a teacher of things known already, forced to use 
all his time in endless routine work. 

I am not at all inclined to show things in their most 
extreme consequences, nor to use any extravagant lan- 
guage. Yet when labor leaders sometimes say that the 
condition of the modern wage-worker is worse than 
slavery, I must admit that in one particular respect this 
is undoubtedly true. The slave was fed, sheltered and 
clothed. Supposing even that the ordinary common 
laborer is employed all the year, round, he can hardly do 
more than that for himself. But the slave had his price, 
and the wage-worker has not. I am told that in slavery 
times, in the Southern States, an able-bodied, young 



the; modern :e;coNOMic syste:m 201 

healthy negro cost as much as a thousand dollars. Re- 
presenting thus a considerable amount of capital invest- 
ed, his owner had good cause to keep him healthy and 
strong, at all events as much cause as the owner of a 
valuable horse has to take good care of the animal. Such 
considerations do not exist in modern industry. The 
large modern factory employs hands which have to per- 
form a certain amount' of labor ; if they cannot do it, the 
employer has no further use for them. The modern 
laborer is only paid while he works, and no personal 
relations of any kind exist between employer and em- 
ployee; most frequently they do not even know each 
Other. In case of sickness, old age, decrepitude etc., the 
workingman is left to his own resources, which in many 
cases simply mean charity. There has never been an 
economic system, in which naked materialism governed 
all relations so completely as the modern. 

Some time ago it was reported in the newspapers that 
certain railroads had issued an order not only to employ 
nobody above the age of forty-five, but even to discharge 
such who were above that age and were in their posi- 
tions only a certain time. While this was done openly, 
and therefore appeared in a m.easure startling, yet it is 
a fact that it is generally very difficult for persons of 
advanced age to find employment, because it is of more 
advantage to employ persons of full strength and vigor. 
It is a cruelty forced upon employers who have person- 
ally no wish at all to be cruel. This cruel eflfect of our 
economic conditions becomes more apparent when we 
reflect how difficult it has gradually become to start a 
business of one's own without capital, and how the 
amount of capital necessary has constantly grown. I be- 
lieve that the majority of our rich business men who 



202 1.00'KING FORWARD 

started thirty or forty years ago with small means, could 
not repeat the operation to-day. Statistics show that, 
in proportion to the growth of population, the number* 
of independent owners of business-establishments is de- 
creasing, while the number of employees is correspond- 
ingly increasing, a fact which, of necessity, must unfa- 
vorably influence sturdiness and manliness of civil char- 
acter. 

Whether insanity is increasing in consequence of our 
economic conditions, as is frequently stated, or whether 
this increase is only apparent in consequence of our more 
humane treatment of the insane, and bringing them to- 
gether in large public institutions, I will not investigate, 
but that modern industrial conditions very badly affect 
the physical condition of the workers, and have a phys- 
ically degenerating effect is subject to statistical proof. 
English statistics of some fifty years ago show that the 
average duration of life in England was thirty-four and 
one third years. In manufacturing cities, however, it 
was different. In Leeds the average duration of life 
was twenty-one, in Manchester twenty, in Liverpool 
seventeen years. Belgian statistics show that in the city 
of Brussels the yearly death rate is one out of fifty 
among the very wealthy, one out of twenty-seven among 
small businessmen and mechanics and one out of four- 
teen among day laborers. The French stastician Vil- 
lerme showed some forty years ago that about one-half 
of the children of spinners and weavers in the city of 
Milhouse die before they reach the second year of age. 
(These figures are taken from Ferdinand Lassalle's 
Frankfort speech.) German and Swiss statistics show 
similar results, and who can doubt that American sta- 
tistics, if there were any of this character, would be of 



THB MODERN ECONOMIC SYSTEM 203 

the same kind? I recollect that during the great strike 
of the Anthracite miners of Pennsylvania in 1903, the 
government sent officers into the mining districts to re- 
cruit men for the navy. Their efforts, however, proved 
futile, because, as they reported, the miners, having for 
years been underfed, v^ere not physically fit for service 
in the navy. 

European military statistics show that in order to 
complete the annual recruiting lists, it became neces- 
sary to constantly reduce the required size of the men. 
Prior to the great revolution it was in France 165 centi- 
meters, it was gradually reduced until in 1870 it was 
only 154, a decrease of the normal height of the human 
body of eleven centimeters within one century. In 
Saxony, in 1780, the required height was 178 centime- 
ters, in 1862 it was only 155. 

Three years ago, the newspapers contained the fol- 
lowing dispatch: London, March loth, (1903). The 
annual report of the inspector general of the British 
army, which has just been issued, confirms many previ- 
ous statements that the physique of the British working 
class is deteriorating. The report says that one subject 
which causes anxiety for the future as regards recruit- 
ing is the gradual deterioration of the physique of the 
working classes, from which the bulk of recruits must 
always be drawn. When it is remembered that the re- 
cruiters are instructed not to submit candidates for 
enlistment for medical examination unless they can be 
reasonably expected to pass as fit, one cannot but be 
struck by the percentage, namely, 32.22 considered by 
the medical officers unfit for service. In reports from 
all the manufacturing districts stress is invariably laid 
upon the number of men medically rejected. 



204 LOOKING FORWARD 

About a year ago the newspapers contained the fol- 
lowing : 

''Berlin, March 4 (1905). — It is learned from reli- 
able sources that this year's conscription in Berlin and 
vicinity showed remarkably unfavorable results, inas- 
much as a large percentage of the young recruits is 
physically incapable of military service/' 

Newspapers recently informed their readers that a 
Japanese statesman made in an interview the statement 
that Japan, knowing that war with Russia would sooner 
or later become inevitable, preferred to fight now, be- 
cause it was feared that the development of modern in- 
dustry might produce such physical degeneration that the 
country could not then successfully cope with Russia. 

No commentary could add to the impressiveness of 
these figures and statements. 

The history of civilization is one of continued saving 
of human labor force in the production of the neces- 
saries of life, so much so that civilization and saving of 
human labor force are almost synonymous. So far, 
however, the result of it has not been less work, but 
more eflfective work and creation of more wealth. But 
the time will come when the practical result will be less 
work and more leisure. We will have not only more 
but also better machinery than now. The era of ma- 
chinery has only commenced. The time will come when 
all heavy and all loathsome work will be done by auto- 
matic machinery and all unpleasant and obnoxious fea- 
tures of labor will disappear. This will result in an 
improvement of the human race and will go far toward 
the removal of the physical and intellectual distinctions 
between the different classes of society. For it cannot 
be denied that continuous heavy physical work has a 



the: modern e^conomic syste:m 205 

brutalizing effect, that continuous dirty work kills the 
aesthetic sense, and that the monotony of modern fac- 
tory labor produces dullness of mind and lack of ambi- 
tion. For all we know, therev may still be natural forces 
of which we know nothing and which we may yet dis- 
cover. The science of electricity is still in its infancy, 
and the time will come when the triumph of human in- 
tellect over the forces of nature will be so complete that 
comparatively little physical labor will be necessary, and 
the performance of the little that will be will be a 
pleasure. 

But while progress in production ran all the time in 
the direction of saving human labor force, the develop- 
ment of distribution ran in the opposite direction. The 
history of distribution is, at least for the last hundred 
or two hundred years, a history of an enormous waste 
of human labor force. It is one of the characteristics 
of the competitive system that it costs sometimes more 
to sell an article than to make it. Speaking generally, 
production is in the end governed by consumption. 
Things are ultimately bought because they are needed, 
not because they are offered for sale. Yet, in conse- 
quence of the distance between producer and consumer, 
and principally in consequence of competition, an enor- 
mous quantity of human energy is employed in the 
efforts to sell. The result of these efforts, however, is 
neither a general increase of consumption nor a general 
increase of production, for what is sold by one remains 
unsold by another. A number of competing shoe man- 
ufacturers, for instance, may send out ever so many 
salesmen, there is not, as a result of their efforts, a sin- 
gle pair of shoes more consumed. Every increase of 



206 LOOKING FORWARD 

the sales of one manufacturer must necessarily result in 
a corresponding decrease of the sales of the other. 

An enormous amount of human labor force is prac- 
tically wasted in printing, lithographing, painting, post- 
ing, and so forth, for no other purpose but advertising. 
Wasted, because the products of that labor add noth- 
ing to human comfort and the stock of national wealth, 
while those engaged in that work must, for their prac- 
tical subsistence, draw on the stock of necessaries of 
life produced by others. Yet, so absurd is our eco- 
nomic system that this waste is considered a boon be- 
cause it is a source of employment. 

This waste has been so immense that reaction was 
bound to follow. It came in the shape of combinations, 
generally called trusts. Of course, those who combined 
acted not from motives of political economy, but from 
motives of private economy. Business men are not in 
the habit of studying and consulting political economy. 
They are not philosophers, but judge from experience 
and from the effect of economic causes on their private 
interests. The trust was created because competition had 
become ruinous. It had developed to a degree where, 
instead of being beneficial, it became injurious. The 
elements of self-destruction in the system commenced 
to operate. The competitive system commenced to be- 
come enimical to the best interests of capital and entered 
the first stage of its collapse. For a long time consid- 
ered the life of trade, it is now feared that it may be- 
come the death of trade. 

What the trust will lead to is, for the present, hid- 
den in the future. It may develop into a system of its 
own, lasting for some time. It may be only the first 
stage of an entirely new economic system, beginning to 



the: mod]^rn economic system 207 

develop. In neither case will it be permanent. It is 
absolutely impossible that society will suffer the perma- 
nency of an institution which invests a comparatively 
small number of private corporations and a still smaller 
number of gigantic combinations, with the power of 
controlling the production, the exchange and the trans- 
portation of the necessaries of life. It is impossible that 
society will forever suffer an economic institution to, 
honestly or corruptly, shape legislation and influence the 
administration of justice in the interest of the few that 
possess and manipulate the wealth of the country, and 
to rob the masses of the people of every shred of inde- 
pendence by making ninety-nine out of a hundred the 
hired servants of the remaining one. The best inter- 
ests of human society will not grant the private trust a 
very long existence. Its reign is, perhaps, preparing the 
advent of a new economic order of society, and all 
efforts to destroy it merely for the purpose of maintain- 
ing or re-establishing the reign of competition will prove 
futile. Some future generation may, perhaps, recognize 
in it the beginning of the gradual application of the 
principle of association as the basis of the economic 
structure of society. 

Two things, I believe, may be taken for certain. One 
is the fact that competition, as a system, is in its death- 
struggle, and the other is the continuance of the process 
of combination in industry, commerce and transporta- 
tion. Combinations may fail, combination will go on. 
At the same time, democratical sentiment, the feeling of 
self-esteem and the confidence in their own power wull 
grow among the masses of the people. They thirst more 
for information and read more than they ever did. I 
believe some future generation will deal with the com- 



208 IvOOKlNG FORWARD 

binations in a method different from ours. It will, prob- 
ably, not waste time and energy in fruitless attempts to 
destroy what evolution has produced, but will try to 
apply it to the use and benefit of the nation. It will 
fully understand the immense value of combination as 
an instrument for the saving of human labor force and 
increasing the productiveness of its application. Human 
society will not lose and sacrifice this effect, but will 
make it subservient to the interests of the whole nation. 



VIII. 

Conclusion. 

Knowledge of the past, based upon contemporane- 
ous testimony, reaches back some fifty or sixty centuries. 
Based upon surmise and conjecture, resting on circum- 
stantial evidence, it looks back upon, perhaps, many hun- 
dreds of thousands of years. When man sprang into 
existence, he was, probably, not much superior, if supe- 
rior at all, to the highest developed animals of which we 
know. To-day, the lowest savages are in possession of 
articulate language, some sort of social organization, and 
some sort of moral feeling. Innumerable centuries must 
have passed before man reached even the stage of the 
savages existing to-day. Equally innumerable were the 
centuries of savagery and barbarism, except where sav- 
ages and barbarians came into contact with civilization. 
Civilization has advanced rapidly within the historic 
period, and the rapidity of the advance constantly in- 
creased as the velocity of the falling stone increases the 
nearer it approaches the earth. It took man longer, and 
it cost, perhaps, much more mental effort to invent the 
bow and arrow than it now requires to invent the most 
complicated machine. 

Human history is a history of continued uninter- 
rupted progress. To say that any civilization ever de- 
clined and disappeared is false. When nations perished, 
their civilization was not lost, but was taken up and con- 
tinued by other nations. When the Roman empire fell, 

209 



210 I.OOKING FORWARD 

civilization did not perish. What was best in Graeco- 
Roman civilization had already been adopted by the 
Germans. And during all times the human race has 
steadily improved, intellectually, morally and, in some 
respects, undoubtedly, also physically. 

There is no stronger instinct in either man or ani- 
mal than that of self-preservation. All other instincts, 
and, as far as man is concerned, all thought and action 
are subservient to it. There is one thing that man must 
have in all stages of culture from the lowest to the high- 
est, and that is the necessaries of life for his subsistence. 
Dififerent as they may be in different stages of culture, 
the first natural impulse goes toward obtaining them, 
and the first effort of thought and action is directed 
toward that end. The manner of finding and acquiring, 
and, later on, the manner of producing the necessaries 
of life has shaped human sentiment, has brought forth 
the moral sense and created moral laws, has undoubtedly 
influenced the development of mythologies, creeds and 
gods and has developed and given form to social and 
political institutions. Considering the term necessaries 
of life in the broad sense of civilization, including its 
comforts and even its luxuries, no moral precept and no 
institution antagonistic to the prevailing manner of pro- 
" ducing them can last. As we find in the history of man, 
step by step, one change after the other in the mode of 
production, so we find, step by step, corresponding 
changes in moral and political laws, in social and polit- 
ical institutions. These changes display an uninter- 
rupted tendency of the latter to set themselves in har- 
mony with the former. If to-day we were to follow all 
the precepts and commands of the bible, our whol^ in- 
dustrial, commercial and credit system would become 



CONCI.USION 211 

impossible. We could have no private property in land, 
we could' take no interest on loans or debts, could keep 
neither pledge nor mortgage in possession and would 
not be allowed to suffer any one to become a pauper. 
Upon the other hand, the moral sentiments expressed in 
the Old Testament would not prevent us from keeping 
slaves, nor the men from being bigamists or polyga- 
mists. I believe to have good reason for assuming that 
Christ's opinion that it were easier for a tamel to go 
through a needle's ear than for a rich man to enter the 
kingdom of heaven does not much trouble the conscience 
of any millionaire, nor hinder any one from striving to 
become one. If we had continued to look upon women 
with the same sort of moral feeling as the apostles and 
fathers of the church did, the men would still thank God 
every day for not having created them women, and the 
latter would still be in the most abject condition. 

No conquering nation has ever felt moral scruples 
to make the inhabitants of another country captives and 
slaves, or to take and use its land, and modern moral 
sentiment does not practically interfere with the conduct 
of bloody wars for the expansion of trade. 

Economic motives are at the bottom of all of it. Eco- 
nomic motives govern the actions of men and nations 
to-day as they ever did. Evolution effected gradually, 
and from time to time, great changes in economic condi- 
tions and in the motives and sentiments springing from 
them. There is not the slightest reason to believe that 
present economic conditions and present moral views and 
social and political institutions will henceforth remain 
unchanged. That they will change in the future is as 
certain as that they have changed in the past. The 
uncertainty is only in the manner and the result of the 



212 I.OOKING FORWARD 

change. Upon this point opinions may and will differ. 
But it is not necessary to guess blindly, for evolution 
works along the line of progress and knows no retro- 
gression. We may be sure that there will be no return 
to former methods; we may be sure that in the future, 
as heretofore, production will use the most effective 
methods available, and that the use of machinery will be 
still more extended. The use of machinery will, as it 
does now, make necessary the working together of 
many, the concentration of production at central points. 
There can be no return to the shop which was replaced 
by the factory. Human power of production will con- 
tinue to grow, and the time will come when human soci- 
ety will not allow production to be retarded by artificial 
means in the interest of the owners of the instruments 
of production. Production will be carried on in the 
most economical way and human energy and labor force 
will not be treated as a commercial commodity and 
wasted in the interest of a part of society, but, being 
inseparable from man, will be treated as part of him. It 
is not probable that this can be achieved by letting pro- 
duction and distribution remain private business. The 
probability rather is that they will have to be made a 
public affair. Society has an interest in the welfare of 
its members; so much is already acknowledged to-day. 
After a while society will clearly see that the welfare 
of its members can best be extended and preserved by 
the most extensive use of its power of production and 
that such use is impossible under the prevailing eco- 
nomic system. Then will come a time of experiment- 
ing, and out of these experiments, perhaps only after 
many mistakes and failures, a new economic system will 
arise. Nor will it come without severe class-struggles. 



CONCLUSION 213 

The lower economic class will, as the lower classes have 
always done, use all its energy in bettering its condition 
and will strive to rise to the level of the class above, 
while the ruling economic class will defend its position 
with the same energy and the same assurance of rights 
as political classes ever defended theirs. They will in- 
sist upon being let alone with a pertinacity equal to that 
of the political classes which insisted upon their God- 
given privileges. From an historical standpoint, far 
above party and class-interests, the often heard talk of^ 
harmony between capital and labor, as generally under- 
stood, is merely an illusion. Through the whole history 
of the human race, since the beginning of the institu- 
tion of private property, we witness the everlasting 
struggles between the different classes of society. Mod- 
ern civilization can make an effort to eliminate from 
these struggles acts of brutality and barbarism, but noth- 
ing can prevent or end them except the creation of an 
economic system, which makes the existence of classes 
impossible. 

The large majority of men are timid and afraid lest 
they may flee from known evils to greater unknown 
evils. But we need not feel any terror of the future 
and may examine all propositions for reforms and 
changes in our institutions with calm consideration. For 
through all the centuries of the past, with all their inno- 
vations and changes, the condition of human society has 
gradually and constantly improved, and the human race 
has grown better. There is no reason to be afraid of 
the future, certainly not from the standpoint of human- 
ity at large. Even not from the standpoint of individ- 
ual man. For after all, human life is but temporary and 
we are beyond those superstitions which caused the 



214 LOOKING FORWARD 

burial of a dead man's horses and servants and symbols 
of treasure along with him for use in the other world. 
After all, every human being has only one body to shel- 
ter, one body to clothe, one stomach to fill. And if one 
has what is necessary to live comfortably, and to satisfy 
one's intellectual and aesthetic tastes, it is enough for 
material happiness. Whatever goes beyond that can 
only serve the vulgar desire of ostentation. All that is 
necessary to add for the purpose of making happiness 
complete, in so far as access to physical things can do 
that, is, beside the certainty of having so much, the cer- 
tainty that those whom we love and whom we leave be- 
hind will enjoy the same material happiness. Compared 
with the enormous fortunes and incomes of the favored 
few, it takes very little to satisfy all reasonable demands 
for well-being and comfort, and it cannot be disputed 
that in our times the productive power of man and na- 
ture together is fully adequate to their satisfaction. 
From a general social and human standpoint the accu- 
mulation of great fortunes becomes absurd and useless, 
being able only to gratify the lust of power and ostenta- 
tion. 

It is urged sometimes in defense of our present sys- 
tem that wealth is the powerful incentive to human 
effort, and that without this incentive human talent and 
intellect would be without an object for which to mani- 
fest themselves. I do not believe it. While I admit 
that man needs an incentive, an object for his efforts, I 
cannot admit that there can be no other incentive but 
wealth. Perhaps under the present system of produc- 
tion and distribution, under present social and political 
arrangements, it may be impossible to find a stronger, 
nay even another incentive. But every economic sys- 



CONCI.USION 215 

tern and the social arrangements growing out of it, cre- 
ate their own incentives, their own ambitions, their own 
intellectual and moral sentiments. To the ancient Gre- 
cian a laudation or a wreath in the Olympic games was 
as much an incentive for putting forth his best efforts 
as money is to modern man. Men have given up their 
lives for the sake of liberty, men have sacrificed their 
lives for their country. In neither case could they them- 
selves enjoy the fruits of their action. Is there any rea- 
son why the good of society, and indirectly that of one- 
self, may not be an equally strong incentive? If our 
economic system has so shaped our minds and interests 
that we cannot think of any other incentive but wealth, 
it does not necessarily follow that there can be no other 
incentive under other and different conditions. 

I am firmly of the opinion that our economic system 
IS not favorable to the highest development of the human 
race. Granted that it was the logical consequence of 
what was before, granted that it contributed immensely 
to the development of the race to its present point, and 
that it was a necessary stage in the progress of civiliza- 
tion, I think it has reached its highest point of useful- 
ness and must give way to a better system, if civiliza- 
tion is to progress as it has progressed heretofore. The 
future system must grow out of the present system. It 
must be the logical sequence of it. It cannot be in- 
vented, it must grow and develop. A prevailing sys- 
tem, especially one as complex as ours, cannot be sud- 
denly destroyed and immediately replaced by another 
entirely new and complete. It will be the result of grad- 
ual adjustment. W>hile it is quite natural for the sociol- 
ogist or the economist to construct in his mind such a 
new system, he should be careful not to build his castle 



216 * LOOKING FORWARD 

in the air, but on the firm ground of existing institu- 
tions, and consider the possibilities and probabiHties of 
evolution. 

The average man is conservative and has always mis- 
givings about proposed changes and reforms. He is 
always afraid of their non-adaptability to human nature. 
As a rule, however, this fear is groundless. Man is as 
much, if not more, the creature of his surroundings than 
his surroundings are the creature of his mind and will. 
If we attempt to retrace all social and economic changes 
and man's adjustment to them to the beginning, we find 
that the natural surroundings eixsted before man came 
into them, and that man had to arrange his mode of liv- 
ing according to them. The observation of evil effects 
of these surroundings impelled him to improve them, 
and as they grew better, they also improved him and 
created in him new needs and new desires, made another 
man of him. Better conditions gave him new inspira- 
tions and infused him with new moral ideas. So will it 
also be in the future. Men will adjust themselves to 
their surroundings and a better economic system will 
create the type of men suited to it in intellectual, phys- 
ical and moral capacity. I have no fault to find with 
those who believe that God infused man from the start 
with moral sentiments and moral ideas, and that human 
institutions were the result of these sentiments and ideas, 
but I am of a different opinion. At any rate, I cannot see, 
if it was God who has implanted man with moral ideas, 
why he should have planted into man different moral 
ideas at different times. 

As every economic system creates moral ideas fittmg 
it, so it gives birth to crimes peculiarly its own. Under 
our system of economics nine-tenths of all crimes known 



CONCIvUSION 217 

are crimes against property, or such as have for their 
object the gain of property. Our laws mention many a 
crime of which other laws, for instance the Mosaic law, 
knew nothing. 

It will, in all probability, be one of the characteristics 
of the future economic system that labor force and the 
instruments of labor are nearer together than they are 
now. At present the man using his physical labor force 
and the man owning the instruments of labor are dif- 
ferent persons. It follows as an unavoidable result that 
the former is dependent upon the latter, that he must 
sell him his labor force for a market price, and that both 
belong to different classes of society. Under the effect 
of a new economic system, which brings labor force 
and instruments of labor nearer together, conditions of 
extreme wealth and extreme poverty will disappear and 
the state or government will not be dominated over by 
an economic class. There can be no real freedom, nor 
real political equality, until there are no more economic 
classes. Where there is general economic independence 
no economic class will find tools for the execution of its 
will among those who form the government, and the 
government being then not only in name, but in fact 
the representative of all the citizens, and not as now of 
a class only, will have to assume functions which polit- 
ical science, shaped by class-interests, would not allow 
it to assume at present. 

The conception of liberty will, in all probability, be 
quite different from what it is now, and the ethical views 
of the time may carry governmental protection farther 
than merely against violence and fraud. There is no 
positive liberty. It is always relative. The conscious- 
ness of liberty depends on the harmony between individ- 



218 LOOKING FORWARD 

ual needs and desires and the possibility of their satisfac- 
tion. But neither individual needs and desires, nor the 
possibility of their satisfaction, are always the same. 

The highest civilization and the highest moral con- 
ception can only be worked out in a condition of eco- 
nomic independence. Of course, not that individual in- 
dependence which has the dependence of another for its 
footstool, but the economic independence of all, which 
can only be had under a government capable of secur- 
ing it and instituted to that end. 

The state, as constituted at present, would be incap- 
able of securing such independence, even if it existed. 
Although we still witness the accumulation and increase 
of immense fortunes, we may nevertheless be sure that 
the moment will come when disintegration will set In 
and the process of equalization will commence. Society 
will erect a new economic structure, and sooner or later 
create a political edifice in harmony with It and adapted 
to its mode of production and distribution. 

The new mode of production and distribution will 
not only produce a higher form of government, but also 
a higher form of the family. The highest form of the 
family can only evolve under economic conditions which 
make husband and wife economically Independent of 
each other, so that no considerations of an economic 
nature will enter into the holiest and most intimate rela- 
tion between two human beings. The more one delves 
into the novelistic and dramatic literature of our times, 
the more one becomes convinced that the marriage prob- 
lem is one of the deepest felt problems of the present 
age. True, those plots and narratives are all invented, 
but they are nevertheless the reflex of actual life. These 
narrations of mistakes, changes of feeling, incompatibil- 



CONUITCrSlON 219 

ity of temper or sentiment, describing the woe and mis- 
ery following, speak a most pathetic language and sound 
like a cry of longing for happier forms of marriage and 
like a wail of despair of finding them. But, they are 
sure to come some time under another economic system. 

In the second volume of his '^Sociology," Herbert 
Spencer says : ''In primitive phases while permanent 
monogamy was developing, union in the name of the 
law — that is, originally, the act of purchase — was ac- 
counted the essential part of the marriage, and union in 
the name of aflfection was not essential. In the present 
day union in the name of the law is considered the most 
important, and union by aflfection the less important. A 
time will come when union by aflfection will be consid- 
ered the most important, and union in the name of the 
law the least important, and men will hold in reproba- 
tion those conjugal unions in which union by aflfection 
is dissolved.'' 

While Herbert Spencer is ethnologically and historic- 
ally in error, because marriage by purchase and monog- 
amyy even in its beginnings, did not exist contemporane- 
ously, his philosophy is quite true. 

I doubt that there is anything more destructive of 
good will and aflfection in marriage than the consicous- 
ness of possession and the diflficulty or impossibility of 
separation. The eflforts of the parties toward winning 
each other by presenting themselves from their best 
sides, make room for an abandonment and carelessness 
in dress and appearance, and a want of politeness in 
manner and mutual intercourse, which, as between hus- 
band and wife, have become almost proverbial and a 
prolific source of jests in humerous periodicals. They 
would in good society not be tolerated even between 



220 I.OOKING FORWARD 

strangers. Yet all this could be different, for there Is 
no man who may not fascinate some woman, nor is there 
a woman, be she ever so homely, who may not look 
charming in the eyes of some man ; and there are few 
between whom the feeling of love and affection may 
not be preserved for life, if it were as carefully culti- 
vated after marriage as it was before marriage. 

The best medicine against social ills is freedom. 
Granting that society must guard against abuse of it, it 
remains true, nevertheless, that with the advancement 
of civilization and the exaltation of ethical conceptions, 
sentiment and conscience must more and more take the 
place of police orders and penal laws and restrictions. 
I feel satisfied that even to-day the majority of men 
would neither commit larceny nor murder, even if they 
were not forbidden and punished by law. The want of 
economic freedom and independence makes cowards of 
us all and hypocrites of many of us. Men have sup- 
pressed their best thoughts for fear of economic injury, 
and others have shammed beliefs and opinions for the 
same reason. That has happened in the sphere of pol- 
itics, in the sphere of religion and in the sphere of phi- 
losophy and science. The freedom of speech is given to 
us by the law, but it is chained by economic considera- 
tions, by the fears which economic conditions produce, 
and by the feeling of the necessity to do for the sake of 
business or position what one would not do for the sake 
of conscience. 

It may be that in the activities of this world, each 
sex has its proper sphere. But I have always consid- 
ered it an assumption on the part of men to attempt to 
determine for themselves the proper sphere of women. 
In so far as they have done it, they have betrayed noth- 



CONCIvlJSION 221 

ing but selfishness. Although they do not object to the 
employment of women as wage-workers in shops, offices 
and stores, there are a good many vocations out of 
which they seek to keep her by proclaiming those voca- 
tions to be peculiarly within the sphere of men. Most 
men still entertain the opinion that the proper sphere of 
woman is nowhere but within the home, and that the 
only mission of woman upon this earth is to please and 
comfort man, provided he is her husband. It does not 
suit their taste to see women striving more and more 
for independence and interesting themselves in matters 
of public concern. Her right to higher education and 
learning was only grudgingly acknowledged, and there 
are still universities, on both sides of the Atlantic, which 
close their doors to women. But nothing is more 
tabooed, nothing considered less within the sphere of 
women than politics. There, still, is little chance in the 
United States for giving women the right of suffrage 
outside of the few states in which it was granted to 
them, probably for local purposes and principally, I sup- 
pose, because it was thought to be of advantage to the 
temperance cause. Yet women pay the same taxes on 
property, if they have any, as men; they are subject to 
the same criminal laws and to the same civil laws : and, 
if they stand alone, must find their support without any 
aid from the state. Is it just, then, to give them no 
voice in rating taxation or in making the laws? Taxa- 
tion without representation was one of the causes for 
which the American colonies rebelled against England. 
Are not our women taxed without representation ? And 
considering stamp duties', import duties and the shift- 
ing effect of taxes, are not all those women who must 
make a living for themselves taxed, even if they pay no 



222 LOOKING FORWARD 

direct property tax? Are they not compelled to obey 
laws made by others for them ? Is this not gross injus- 
tice? 

One of the many silly reasons given for it is this, 
that men should have the superior right of legislation 
because on them also involves the duty of defending the 
country in time of war. True^ quite true, but it is to 
be hoped that in course of time there will be no more 
wars. Yet I think this special duty of men is offset by 
a special function of women, namely, that of giving birth 
to the future generation. It is a question where there 
is more pain and suffering and more heroism, on the 
battle-field or in child-bed. It is a question whether 
death reaps a richer harvest on the battle-field or in 
child-bed. Because in the one case the sufferings are 
spread out, and in the other they are concentrated, in 
time and space, so that the sensation of horror in both 
cases is not the same, we have no opportunity to make 
comparisons. There is, however, no question that the 
function of bringing forth life is more useful to society 
than that of taking life, no matter for what purpose. 
And there is neither hope nor fear that child-bearing 
will ever come to an end. 

The reasons most generally stated, why women 
should not be in politics, as not being their proper 
sphere, are of a sentimental nature and reflect sorely and 
sadly on our political life. It is, however, not worth 
the trouble to investigate whether politics would cor- 
rupt women, or women would purify politics. First, 
because sentimental reasons do not weigh heavily in the 
development of social institutions and political rights, 
and secondly, it is greatly to be doubted that these are 
true reasons. I believe that the cowardice of men, their 



CONCI.USION 223 

fear of being overawed by woman, has much to do with 
it. Men feel in their private and family life the power 
which women have over them and fear that power in 
public life. They fear it because they do not under- 
stand the cause of it. 

It sounds, perhaps, paradoxical to say that between 
persons of unequal strength, bound together by ties of 
duty or affection, the weaker is practically the stronger, 
but it is true. The power of woman over man under 
our social and economic condition has its source in her 
weakness and dependence, and is for that reason an igno- 
ble power. A woman may with impunity commit 
against a man offenses which would meet with violent 
resentment, if they came from a man. The economic 
dependence of woman robs man of his freedom of action, 
unless he is devoid of all feeling. The economic and 
social dependence of woman stirs his chivalrous nature; 
he knows and feels that the woman needs him, and he 
submits when otherwise he would not. By parity of 
reasoning it appears plain that with the growth of the 
economic and social independence of women, man would 
also become freer and more independent. A chivalrous 
nature is always apt to become the slave of the weak. 
Daughters are far more apt to rule a household than 
sons, because the latter can easier care for themselves 
than the former and may with less scruples be told to 
go. A baby can make all the members of a household 
its slaves. It is a slavery which can be abolished only in 
two ways: either the stronger must become brutal or 
the weaker must become stronger. Is it necessary to 
point out the better and more civilized way? 

And yet, I am frank enough to say that I do not set 
much expectation on female suffrage under present con- 



224 IvOOKING FORWARD 

ditions. To be sure, if its introduction would depend 
on my vote, I would without a moment's hesitation cast 
it in its favor as a matter of justice. But I would do it 
with the conviction that it would, for the present, not 
materially further the cause of women. Our political 
fights are class-fights. The lack of consciousness that 
they are does not change the fact. The absence of priv- 
ileged classes conceals it, and the economic classes and 
their struggles are not generally understood. How- 
ever, as the comprehension of our economic system 
grows, the political class-fight will become more pro- 
nounced. I am well aware of the fact that such words 
as class-struggles, class-fights, etc., have an odious sound 
in the ears of many, but it is of no use to shut our eyes 
to facts, nor is anything gained by self-deception. If 
one fails to discover in the early history of our country 
the economic class-struggle, such failure is pardonable; 
but if one fails to discover it in the political struggles 
of the last fifty years, in the everlasting tariff-wrangles, 
in the rise and fall of greenbackism and populism, in the 
candidacy of Bryan and the advocacy of the free coin- 
age of silver, in the candidacy of Hearst as the friend 
of the ''^small man," in the slow, but steady, growth of 
the socialist party, in the attempt of legislation against 
the trusts, in the efforts of labor organizations to obtain 
favorable legislation, he is stricken with almost unpar- 
donable blindness. 

Now, while the political struggles bear the character 
of class-struggles, the women as such form no particular 
economic class. Their interests are identical with those 
of their fathers or their husbands, and they would gen- 
erally vote like these. For a long time to come the par- 
ticipation of women in politics would probably not influ- 



CONCI^USION 225 

ence legislation, because it would not change the pro- 
portional strength of political parties. 

But it may have a great intellectual influence. It 
may teach women the importance and bearing of eco-» 
nomic questions, it may broaden their minds, they will 
become interested in affairs to which they have hereto- 
fore not paid any attention, they will become closer 
observers, will learn to understand the world better, will 
not waste, as they do now, their energy in small and 
insignificant matters, as for instance the political tem- 
perance movement, will become more tolerant and will 
learn that freedom is a far better educator than coer- 
cion and restraint. 

We hear it said that women are not fit for politics 
and matters of public concern, because they are gener- 
ally influenced more by sentiment than by reason. I do 
not care to dispute that they are more subject to senti- 
ment and emotion than men. It would, indeed, be aston- 
ishing if the diflference in physical condition and natural 
functions were not associated with psychic differences; 
but are we quite sure that it might not be better for 
human society if its affairs were conducted with a little 
less reason and a little more sentiment? And may not 
the overbalancing power of sentiment over reason in 
woman be more or less the product of her social status, 
which made the use of the one more practicable to her 
than the other? It is quite true that women have so 
far distinguished themselves more in the realm of sen- 
timent than irf that of reason ; that is to say, more in art 
than in science; but this also may be ascribed to the 
social status of woman. That woman, however, is capa- 
ble of distinguishing herself in science has been proved 
in several instances. How could they be numerous 



226 I.OOKING FORWARD 

when for centuries all the higher institutions of learn- 
ing were closed to her,? Be this, however, as it may, 
and granted that each sex has its own proper sphere of 
functions in the social body, I state it as my opinion 
that woman should be given the opportunity to find her 
proper sphere and to work out her own salvation on a 
basis of social and civil equality with men. And I am 
furthermore of the opinion that wherever woman can 
accomplish something good and beneficial, she is in her 
proper sphere. Woman should have a chance of work- 
ing* out her destiny unhampered by legal restrictions and 
social prejudices. 

I have traced the status of woman, the form of the 
family, and the form of social and political government 
through the different stages of human progress and have 
attempted to show their intimate connection with the 
economic conditions as they appeared and disappeared 
and affected the social and political institutions. 

The prevalence of general poverty in the primitive 
state of, mankind resulted quite naturally in communistic 
relations between those who by marriage or descent be; 
longed together. The fact that the labor of each indi- 
vidual scarcely sufficed for his or her own subsistence 
created necessarily a sentiment of equality. Social organ- 
' ization rested altogether on personal relations. The form 
of the family was one best adapted to communism of pov- 
erty. When the stage of agriculture was reached and 
women performed the most important labor, they ac- 
quired superior power and influence, which led to the 
establishment of the matriarchate and corresponding 
changes in the form of the family. The patriarchal fam- 
ily seems to have been particularly adapted to the 
needs of pastoral peoples. With the growth of the effi- 



CONCLUSION 227 

ciency of human labor, the participation of women in 
providing subsistence became less necessary; men per- 
formed it alone and woman lost her power and influ- 
ence. The growth of productive power enabled the in- 
dividual to produce more than what was necessary for 
his own subsistence and the institution of slavery ap- 
peared. In a society in which human beings were de- 
graded to the condition of property, it was quite natural 
that the weak were subjected by the strong, that ethical 
views developed which permitted it, and that the con- 
dition of women grew more abject and subordinate than 
ever. Private property in land was established, and 
classes developed which acquired privileges and power. 
The growth of property interests made necessary an in- 
stitution for their protection. The ancient gentile organ- 
ization proved to be inefficient for the protection of pri- 
vate property and the political state appeared. The 
communistic institutions of old decayed, existence be- 
came uncertain and precarious, large families were dif- 
ficult to support and monogamy became the prevailing 
form of the family. The fact that property consisted 
principally of land and slaves led to wars of conquest 
and Caesarism, and after the fall of Rome and the rise 
of German power, land still being the principal means 
of production, feudalism and serfdom appeared. Neither 
production by slaves nor production by serfs gave 
woman an opportunity to become an economic factor, 
and her social status remained low, as it did also under 
the guild system. Trade and commerce gradually ex- 
panded, better tools were invented, the advantages of 
division of labor became understood, the factory system 
was introduced, legal restraints in trade and commerce 
• Vv ere abolished and the era of free trade and unfettered 



228 I^OOKING FORWARD 

competition began. The bourgeois class grew in power 
and influence. Then came the era of great inventions 
and modern industrialism which democratized the world 
and made the purely economic class of business men the 
ruling class in all civilized countries, monarchies as well 
as republics. Modern industrialism drew women into 
the whirl of economic affairs and she began to become 
an economic factor again. Her social status improved 
and the law granted her many rights of person and prop- 
erty which she had not before. The modern movement 
for the emancipation of women entered upon the stage. 
The deleterious influence of the competitive system on 
the family disclosed itself in a decrease of the number 
of marriages and an increase in the number of divorces, 
evincing a growing unsatisfactory condition of family 
relations. The efforts towards checking divorce by 
legal restraint and the pathetic cry in literature for more 
satisfactory family relations are the reflex of the strug- 
gle going on in human society. At the same time we 
witness a growth of the power of capital, a growth of 
the concentration of its forces, a growth of the dissatis- 
faction of the masses of the people with existing eco- 
nomic conditions, a growth of the bitterness and intensity 
of the fight between capital and labor, a growth of the 
democratical sentiment in the masses of the people and a 
growth of the dissatisfaction with the use of the power 
of the state and the administration of justice. Society 
is in travail and the birth of new forms of economic 
and social institutions is imminent. 

The division of times past into different periods is 
altogether arbitrary. The future historian may let civ- 
ilization begin at a much later period than the historian 
of our times. He may refuse to record pauperism, 



CONCLTJSION 229 

prostitution, child labor, woman wage-labor, economic 
classes, military institutions and wars as attributes of 
civilization, and may put us down as barbarians. How- 
ever, the institutions and conditions of all times have a 
historical right to be. Not only do they come one after 
the other, but all that succeeds comes as the necessary 
fruit and consequence of that which precedes. 

So far, the world has seen four great general sys- 
tems of production, each with its own special form of 
government, having passed slowly and by degrees from 
one into the other. 

First, in archaic times, the system of communism 
of poverty. It created the gentile system of govern- 
ment, a perfectly democratical organization, based on 
personal relation. 

Second, in ancient times, the system of slavery with 
private ownership of land. It created political govern- 
ment, based on territory and property, culminating in 
despotism and Caesarism. 

Third, in mediaeval times, the system of serfdom in 
agriculture, and the system of guilds in industry. The 
corresponding form of government was feudalistic, aris- 
tocratic and autocratic. 

Fourth, in modern times, the system of free compe- 
tition with its capitalistic features. It created modern 
parliamentarism with more or less extended rights of 
suffrage in republics and constitutional monarchies. 

The fifth? That is the problem. It may be already 
in the stage of its inception. What will it look like? 
Will it be, as Morgan believes, a return to the ancient 
gentes in a higher form? Will it be, as Mr. Abbott 
thinks, an industrial democracy, whatever that may 
mean? Will it be socialistic or individualistic in char- 



230 I.OOKING FORWARD 

acter? It would certainly be absurd to believe that our 
social and political system is the highest which the hu- 
man race is able to evolve. So far, there is no unan- 
imity of answer, neither in the world of science nor in 
the world of business, nor in the world of labor. It 
would be idle to deny that the answer is oftener dic- 
tated by interest and social position than by logic and 
reason. But it seems to me that there is a decided ten- 
dency toward socialism, not only in the views prevailing 
among the laboring classes, but also in the world of lit- 
erature and economic science. Indeed, if we consider 
that the present conditions are the result of the unin- 
terrupted application of the principle of individualism 
through centuries, it is difficult, if not impossible, to see 
how the future application of this principle can amelio- 
rate, much less bring about a substantial change of con- 
ditions. What else can Abbott's industrial democracy 
or Morgan's return to the ancient gentes mean but 
socialism in some form ? Political economy, as it is offici- 
ally taught, sees the evils clearly enough, but is abso- 
lutely unable to discover a remedy within the beaten 
path of individualism. 

Nor is this possible. For, so long as instruments 
of labor are in the hands of one class only, and the other 

class must sell to it their labor force and must do it 

.■•■* 
under the power and influence of competition for em- 
ployment, any material change of general conditions 
seems impossible. Effects can never be changed while 
causes remain the same. Nothing even proves this bet- 
ter than occasional individual cases of luck and success. 
The fear of socialism is gradually waning ; the dire 
predictions in case the world should turn socialistic do 
not find as ready believers as formerly; people think 



CONCLUSION 231 

more for themselves, and to-day a well respected citizen 
may advocate socialism without fear of losing caste. 
More people study it than ever did before, and there can 
be no question that the number of those who are unable 
to find another avenue of escape from the evils of our 
economic arrangements but socialism is slowly, but 
steadily, increasing. 

It seems to be a very plain proposition. If the evils 
under which we suffer result from the fact that the in- 
struments of labor are beyond the control of those who 
perform the work on and with them, the remedy is in 
giving them the control. But as a change of control 
from one class to the other would not destroy the classes 
themselves, but would only result in a change of their 
personnel, it is difficult to see what else remains but 
putting the instruments of production within the control 
of all people in their organized capacity, and that is the 
state. 

It is said, however, of socialism that it offers no 
incentive to effort, that it would destroy individuality 
and that it is visionary. 

Of the first charge I have already spoken in this 
chapter. As to the second I have shown that our pres- 
ent economic order is not favorable at all to the devel- 
opment of genius and talent. It does not seem to me 
that the counting room, the stock exchange and the 
^'market," or the work for a mere living in the darkness 
of the mine or the dusty and smoky factory, or the end- 
less and unremunerative toil of women and children cre- 
ate ideal individualities. 

The third objection deserves no consideration at all. 
It is easy enough to brush projects and propositions for 
the future aside with a shrug of the shoulder as vision- 



232 I^OOKING FORWARD 

ary. It has always been done and requires very little 
wisdom. Undoubtedly the guild-master looked upon 
every proposition to free the trades from all restraints 
as perfectly visionary, and if only a hundred years ago 
one would have pictured present conditions as the nec- 
essary consequences of unchecked competition, he would 
have been called a dreamer. 

Whether it is visionary or not cannot be determined 
by the present generation of mankind. Final judgment 
must be passed by a generation of the near or distant 
future. But suppose the doctrine of socialism is false? 
Was not the doctrine of the declaration of independence 
that all men are born free and equal and that they were 
endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights 
also false? Yet, it has filled the people with the hope, 
inspiration and enthusiasm necessary to bring the strug- 
gle for independence to a successful end. 

Every bit of freedom, every approach to equality, 
every extension of political and civil rights was the re- 
sult of social strife and revolution. They were social, 
not natural, creations. The error consisted in stating as 
a fact what was a mere ethical conception. If the social- 
istic idea should also be not more than an ethical con- 
ception, it may nevertheless result in immense changes 
for the benefit of mankind. 

Be this, however, as it may, evolution will take its 
course regardless of objections and the result will be a 
system of economics and government which will mark a 
higher plane of culture, perhaps a civilization grand and 
noble beyond our dreams and a greater and more equally 
distributed amount of happiness for humanity. 

If we look backward and compare what was with 
what is, if we study the progress the world has made 



CONCLUSION 233 

century after century without halt or rest, we can dis- 
cover no ground upon which to base any douht that the 
future will be as much superior to the present as the 
present is to the past. 

Look backward, my dear reader, and when you have 
beheld everything which the power of your mental vision 
enables you to behold, then turn around and look for- 
ward with courage and confidence toward a future 
worthy of your best efforts and endeavors in behalf of 
struggling humanity's hopes and aspirations. 

Human society will not permit an economic system 
which makes one class of the people produce all the 
wealth of another class to last forever. Nor will human 
society permit the permanence of a form of government 
vv^hich takes no notice of man as a natural being, but 
treats him only as a political being, makes the protec- 
tion of property in all its ramifications its highest func- 
tion and leaves man unprotected against its power. Hu- 
man intelligence, impelled by necessity and popular will 
and impulse, will find means to direct the gigantic mass 
of wealth produced day after day by toiling humanity 
into other channels than those running into the coffers 
of comparativelv few individuals and will gradually 
devise and create a form of government adapted to their 
new economic forms. By and by man will understand 
that labor and production are not the object and pur- 
pose of life, but only means to support it. Gradually the 
human mind will be educated to a higher perception of 
the value and dignity of man. All this will be accom- 
plished, not by the good will and kind sentiment of some 
individuals, useful as they may be, but by the ever-pres- 
ent, steady, invincible movement and pressure from the 
lower strata of society towards the upper, using these 



234 I.OOKING FORWARD 

words in an economic and political sense. This move- 
ment has constituted the element of the organic life of 
human society since economic classes have begun to 
exist; without it society would be doomed to decay and 
death. It has always been stronger than the powers 
that were; it will be stronger than the powers that 
are. Nobody can remain a neutral observer of this 
movement; one must take part in it consciously or un- 
consciously, be it as merchant or banker, manufacturer 
or laborer, employer or employee, citizen or subject, and 
must, according to position, understanding or conscience, 
assist or resist it. 

The social struggles which constitute this movement 
must, from the mere fact of their existence and from 
their very nature as class-struggles, result in changes for 
the better; and although it is one of the shortcomings 
of man that his vision is hot powerful enough to pen- 
etrate the veil which forever has hidden the future from 
the human eye, yet man will continue to plan for the 
future and create ideals toward the realization of which 
he will unceasingly strive. He will derive inspiration 
and strength from them in his struggles and efforts ; and 
his confidence in the results of his hopes and endeavors, 
based upon science, logic and experience, reveals to him 
the future in its general outlines, at least. 

THE END. 



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